Minus a lead from Wall St overnight the local market closed softer Friday with the S&P/ASX200 index off 14.3 points, or 0.27%, at 5,320.0, while the broader All Ords index was down 12.3 points, or 0.23%, to 5,314.3.
Big news for foreign investors and politicos today, but otherwise we had a fairly quiet session.
Materials +0.5% and Gold +0.7% were the best performing sectors. Pretty soft elsewhere with the Energy sector starting to show signs of weakness falling another -1.3%. Industrials -0.8%, Health -0.6%, Utilities -0.3%, Telcos -0.2% and Financials -0.2% also gave up ground.
Amongst the big four National Australia Bank added four cents to $34.58. The other three were all softer today with Commonwealth Bank off 20 cents to $77.82, Westpac down 12 cents to $32.88, ANZ losing 14 cents to $31.90.
The AUD was softer trading at 91.02 US cents. The local unit has now lost six cents and six weeks.
Graincorp (GNC) was the big story of the day after Joe Hockey vetoed the proposed takeover of the grain handler by US based Archer Daniel Midlands (ADM). At one stage GNC shares were down close enough to -30%. By the close they recovered from that postion but still finished off -22.14% at $8.72. With ADM left holding 19% of GNC the interesting question is what happens next?
Rio Tinto (RIO) shares were up 2.55% at $66.06 after the miner announced plans to suspend alumina production at its Gove refinery in the Northern Territory. The news comes hot on the heels of Rio’s intention to chop its WA iron ore expansion output plans by nearly 10% saving around $US3 billion in the process.
Village Roadshow (VRL) shares were up 13 cents, or 1.72% at $7.70 after it announced plans to draw back from the US and focus on emerging Asian markets. The company plans to open a new Wet’n’Wild park at the old Wonderland site at Prospect, in Sydney’s west, next month. A water park on Hainan Island in China is also due to open in late 2014 or early 2015.
S&P/ASX 200 Gainers and Losers
Top 5 Gainers;
• RSG RESOLUTE MINING LIMITED +11.11%
• FGE FORGE GROUP LIMITED +9.49%
• PRU PERSEUS MINING LIMITED +5.66%
• CDU CUDECO LIMITED +4.71%
• AGO ATLAS IRON LIMITED +4.57%
Top 5 Losers;
