The Australian share market is expected to open lower today, after heavy losses in the US on Friday.
US economic news: the Labor Department reported that Nonfarm payrolls increased by 54,000 last month, bringing the unemployment rate up to 9.1 per cent.
Friday's figures: Dow Jones Industrial Average, closed 97 points lower at 12,151, S&P500 lost 13 points to close at 1,300 and the NASDAQ lost 41 points to close at 2,733.
European stocks ended the week higher. London was up 7, Paris was up almost a point and Frankfurt up 35.
To Asian markets and stocks were mixed: Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was down 304, Tokyo Nikkei was down 63 and China’s Shanghai Composite was up 23 point.
On Friday the Australian share market ended the week lower. The S&P/ASX 200 Index lost 17 points to close at 4,583. While on the futures market the SPI is currently down 33 points.
Currencies: the Australian Dollar at 7.35AM was buying $1.07.27 US cents, 65.33 Pence Sterling, 86.08 Yen and 73.36 Euro cents.
In Australian economic news, TD Securities will release the Melbourne Institute inflation gauge for May today; the ANZ job ad series for May will be out, and so will Rabobank’s Quarterly Rural Confidence Survey.
Company news: On Friday shares in Transurban Group (ASX:TCL) were down 0.37 per cent at $5.35. The company’s chief executive, Chris Lynch, has threatened that the toll road company may walk away from its involvement in developing the Interstate-95 project in Virginia, in the US. Today’s Australian reports that Mr Lynch will consider abandoning the project if delays to regulatory approvals blow out beyond a year. Mr Lynch said the approval process is largely out of the company’s hands. In the six months to December 31, Transurban Group (ASX:TCL) reported a net profit of $75.9 million.
At the end of last week shares in Rio Tinto Limited (ASX:RIO) were down 0.42 per cent at $79.76. The mining giant’s Australian chief, Sam Walsh, told a business lunch last week that trading in US dollars currently acts as a natural hedge for the company, as its financing is in US dollars. Mr Walsh also did not rule out switching iron ore price settlements to Chinese yuan sometime in the future. For the six months to December 31 2010, Rio Tinto Limited (ASX:RIO) reported a net profit of $14.9 billion.
Ex-dividends: Campbell Brothers (ASX:CPG) will be going ex-dividend today with a 50 per cent franked dividend of $0.75, and Longreach Group (ASX:LRG) will also be going ex-dividend today with a fully franked dividend of $0.10.
Commodities: Gold is up $9.70 to $US1,542 an ounce for the August contract on Comex, silver is down $.01 to $36.19 for July and copper is up $0.06 at $4.13 a pound. Oil is down $0.18 at $100.22 a barrel for July light crude in New York.
