Australian shares look set to drift lower even though US markets surged as China-US trade tensions eased. Wall Street rallied on Monday after Treasury Secretary Mnuchin said that the trade war and the tariffs were "on hold." The Dow Jones closed above 25 000 for the first time since March.
Boeing, Caterpillar and United Technologies, which are all exporters likely to benefit from easing trade tensions, were the best-performing stocks in the index.
Gold ended higher and oil has risen above $72 dollars off the back of concerns about output from Venezuela, iron ore has continued to slide.
MarketsWall Street closed higher yesterday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended the session 1.2 per cent upto close at 25,013, the S&P 500 added 0.7 per cent to close at 2,733 and the NASDAQ gained half a per cent to close at 7394.
European markets closed mostly higher yesterday: London’s FTSE gained 1 per cent, Paris added 0.4 per cent and Frankfurt was closed.
Asian markets closed higher yesterday: Tokyo’s Nikkei closed 0.3% higher, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng added 0.6 per cent, and China’s Shanghai Composite gained 0.6 per cent.
The ASX futures are pointing to a 11 pts drop. Yesterday, the Australian share market closed lower with the S&P/ASX 200 Index losing 3 points to close at 6084.
Company newsAPN Outdoor Group
(ASX:APO) has made a bid for outdoor advertising business Adshel.
The offer has knocked rival oOh! Media’s $470 million bid, off the table.
The company says Adshels street furniture business would provide an attractive complement to APO’s existing out-of-home product offering.
At this stage no agreement has been reached between the parties and there is no certainty that the proposal will result in a deal.
Shares in APN Outdoor Group
(ASX:APO) closed 1.54 per cent higher to $5.29 yesteday.
Ex-dividendsAusNet Services Ltd (ASX: AST) is paying 4.62 cents unfranked. While Incitec Pivot is (ASX: IPL) paying 4 and a half cents also unfranked.
Currencies One Australian Dollar at 7:40AM was buying US75.85 cents, 56.47 Pence Sterling, 84.23 Yen and 64.32 Euro cents.
Commodities Iron ore futures are pointing to a 0.3 per cent drop.
Gold has gained 70c to $US1292 an ounce.
Silver has added 8c to $US16.53 an ounce.
Oil has increased $1.29 to $US72.66 a barrel.
CryptocurrenciesThe three most traded cryptocurrencies are trading lower: Bitcoin has fallen 1.2 per cent to US$8433, Ethereum has lost 2.8 per cent to US$700 and EOS has dropped 3.8 per cent to US$13.52.
