The Australian share market is expected to open higher today after receiving positive offshore leads. Wall St advanced, boosted by solid earnings from the technology sector – Apple a stand out, almost doubling its second-quarter profit, with chipmaker Intel and Web portal Yahoo! adding to the rally.
US investors were also buoyed by positive housing data: The National Association of Realtors reported that existing home sales rose 3.7 per cent in March to a 5.1 million annual rate, coming in higher than expected.
To the figures: On Wednesday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 187 points to close at 12,454. The S&P500 gained 18 points to close at 1,330 and the NASDAQ lifted 58 points to close at 2,803.
European stocks closed stronger: London’s FTSE up 125 points, Paris up 96 and Frankfurt was up 210.
To Asian markets and stocks were also up: Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was up 375, Tokyo Nikkei was up 166 and China’s Shanghai Composite was up 8.
The Australian share market closed over 1 per cent stronger on Wednesday: The S&P/ASX 200 Index rose 66 points to close at 4,859. While on the futures market the SPI is currently 47 points higher.
Turning to currencies and the Australian Dollar at 7:30AM was buying $1.0701 US cents, 65.24 Pence Sterling, 88.28 Yen and 73.71 Euro cents.
Economic news: Due out today is the Australian Bureau of Statistics Producer Price Indexes for the March quarter.
Company news: On Wednesday shares in Rio Tinto Ltd (ASX:RIO) rose 1.24 per cent to close at $83.12. Rio Tinto has boosted its control of Riversdale Mining Ltd (ASX:RIV) to more than 72 per cent after Brazilian steel maker CSN accepted the global miners offer. Earlier this month Rio secured a majority interest in Riversdale, four months after having launched a $3.9 billion takeover of the Mozambique-focused coal miner. CSN has now sold its entire 19.35 per cent stake in Riversdale to Rio, leaving India's Tata Steel holding the remaining interest. In the 2010 financial year Rio Tinto generated a net profit of $14.9 billion.
Yesterday shares in Gunns (ASX:GNS) advanced 2.97 per cent to close at $0.52. Over 300 Gunns shareholders have launched a class action against the forest management company, for allegedly failing to disclose it was headed for a significant fall in profit. Acting on behalf of the shareholders law firm Maurice Blackburn claim that Gunns knew its results for the first half of 2010 were going to be dismal and it did not inform the market, breaching the company's continuous disclosure obligations under the Corporations Act. In the first half of the 2010 financial year Gunns posted a net profit of $400,000, down from $33.6 million the same time a year earlier. While, in the first half of its 2011 financial year Gunns slipped into the red, recording a net loss of $4.6 million.
Ex-dividends: No companies are going ex-dividend today. Among those coming up after the Easter break are Dicker Data and The Trust Company.
Commodities: Gold is up $3.80 to $US1,498 an ounce for the June contract on Comex, silver is up $0.55 to $44.46 for May and copper is up $0.11 at $4.34 a pound. Oil is up $3.17 at $111.45 a barrel for June light crude in New York.
