The Australian stock market is set for a positive open, as investors weigh a bumper full year performance from Westpac Bank against lower gold and oil price headwinds for energy and mining stocks.
Our market is likely to follow solid leads from US stocks, which capped a fourth-straight weekly gain, as investors took in better-than-expected Chinese manufacturing data and a reading on US factory activity.
US economic news
The Institute for Supply Management's US manufacturing purchasing managers index ticked higher in October, topping economists' forecasts, despite the government shutdown. Manufacturing activity rose to 56.4 last month from 56.2 in September.
Currencies
That pushed the greenback higher against the Australian dollar. At 8:20AM the Aussie was buying $US94.48 cents, 59.35 Pence Sterling, 93.33 Yen and 70.07 Euro cents.
But local investors will be watching for a raft of economic data out this week including the outcome of the Reserve Bank's board meeting tomorrow. Economists are expecting interest rates to be left unchanged this Melbourne Cup Day. That will be followed by the release of inflation data, import-export figures, retail trade data, job advertisement numbers and US employment figures.
Figures
Wall Street finished higher on Friday US time: The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 70 points to close at 15,616, the S&P500 gained 5 points to close at 1,762 and the Nasdaq lifted 2 points to close at 3,922.
European markets were subdued: London’s FTSE added 3 points, Paris lost 27 points and Frankfurt fell 26 points.
Asian markets were mixed: Tokyo’s Nikkei lost 126 points, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng added 43 points, and China’s Shanghai Composite lifted 8 points.
The Australian share market gained 0.5 per cent last week however, better than expected Chinese manufacturing figures failed to lift stocks out of the red by Friday’s close. The S&P/ASX 200 index dipped 14 points on Friday, trimming the weekly gain of 25 points to end the week at 5,411. On the futures market the SPI is 24 points higher.
Economic news
The Australian Bureau of Statistics will release the third-quarter index of house prices as well as retail sales data for September. Economists expect a 0.3 per cent increase in retail sales for the month.
Company news
Westpac Banking Corp
(ASX:WBC) has posted a bumper full year result, with cash profit hitting $7.09 billion, an eight per cent increase on last year’s performance. Full-year net profit increased 14 per cent to $6.816 billion. We’ll have more details on that result throughout the day. Shares in Westpac lifted 0.85 per cent on Friday to close at $34.58.
Whitehaven Coal Limited
(ASX:WHC) will hold its annual general meeting in Sydney today. It comes after the miner posted a strong lift in coal production following the relocation and start-up of longwall equipment at its Narrabri Mine. Shares in Whitehaven Coal fell 0.93 per cent on Friday to close at $1.61.
Ex-dividend Shenhua International Limited
(ASX:SHU) will pay 2.5 cents per share unfranked.
Commodities
Gold is down $10.50 to $US1,313 an ounce for the December contract on Comex. Silver is down $0.03 to $21.84 for December. Copper is flat at $3.30 a pound. Oil is down $1.77 at US$94.61 a barrel for December light crude in New York.
