The local share market has extended its gains, rising for the fourth straight day, despite negative Wall Street leads. Across the market all sectors were up with the exception of materials.
At the closing bell the S&P/ASX 200 index closed 0.37 per cent or 23 points higher at 6,286.
On the futures market the Dow futures are up 43 points with ASX200 futures up 19 points.
The value of trades was $4.7 billion on volume of 583 million shares at the close of trade. The top three stocks by value were BHP Billiton Limited
(ASX:BHP), Commonwealth Bank of Australia
(ASX:CBA) and Rio Tinto
(ASX:RIO).
Company news Hospital informatics company Alcidion Group
(ASX:ALC) reported a significant improvement in cash receipts in its most recent quarter to $1.6M driven by a strong uplift in receipts from customers. Alcidion recently announced the completion of the MKM Health and Patientrack acquisitions expanding its local offering to New Zealand, and UK.
Shares in Alcidion Group
(ASX:ALC) closed 3.8 per cent higher at 6c
Oil Search
(ASX:OSH) advised that its 29 per cent owned PNG LNG Project, signed a sale and purchase agreement with Hong Kong’s PetroChina International. The deal will see the PNG LNG supply LNG from July 2018. It involves supplying 0.45 million tonnes of liquefied natural gas (LNG) per year, over a three-year term.
Xero
(ASX:XRO) announced a strategic alliance with a leading full service US payroll platform, Gusto, which ensures its business will offer a full-service payroll solution.
The deal with see Gusto integrate with Xero’s platform in the US with Gusto to provide customer access to full-service payroll in all 50 states.
Sydney Airport
(ASX:SYD) has seen a spike in international passenger numbers in June and year-to-date, with Asian travellers driving up growth. International traffic growth grew five per cent in June, while domestic traffic was flat, compared to the same time last year.
Sydney’s top five fastest growing inbound visitors came from Taiwan, Vietnam, Indonesia, India, and the USA, all recording double digit visitation growth in June 2017.
IPOS:Calix Limited
(ASX:CXL) a company that develop products and applications from R&D of its existing family of patents, started trading today, floating with an issue price of $0.53, opened at $0.65 and closed at $0.63.
Best and worst performers of the dayThe best performing sector was health care adding 1.31 per cent while the worst performing sector was materials, shedding 1.06 per cent.
The best performing stock in the S&P/ASX 200 was Afterpay Touch Group Limited
(ASX:APT), rising 6.30 per cent to close at $14.38. Shares in Pilbara Minerals
(ASX:PLS) and Boral
(ASX:BLD) also higher.
The worst performing stock in the S&P/ASX 200 was CSR Limited
(ASX:CSR), dropping 7.95 per cent to close at $4.05. Shares in Lynus Corporation
(ASX:LYC) and Alumina
(ASX:AWC) lower.
Asian marketsMixed: Japan’s Nikkei has lost 0.3 per cent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng has gained 0.6 per cent and the Shanghai Composite has gained 1.8 per cent.
Commodities and the dollarGold is trading at $US1,223 an ounce.
Light crude is $0.26c up at $US68.01 barrel.
One Australian dollar is buying 73.75 US cents.
To CryptocurrenciesSome of the most traded cryptocurrencies are trading lower. Bitcoin has risen 1.2 per cent to US$7,429, Ethereum has shed about 3.9 per cent to US$459 and EOS has fallen 4.7 per cent to US$8.09.
