Split News Cheers UGL Investors
The reasons for the divorce at engineer and services group, UGL are no different to the separations seen in the Murdoch media empire, at Amcor, the old Fosters, Brambles or a host of other companies.
Read MoreThe reasons for the divorce at engineer and services group, UGL are no different to the separations seen in the Murdoch media empire, at Amcor, the old Fosters, Brambles or a host of other companies.
Read MoreSurprisingly, our market ended up ignoring the goodish Chinese economic data and last Tuesday’s rate cut from the Reserve Bank and finished the week lower.
Read MoreThe Australian reporting season steps up this week with a host of major corporates reporting.
Read MoreDespite new concerns offshore about the ending of the US Federal Reserve’s easing program damaging market confidence and sending interest rates higher, the Australian dollar had its best week for two months last week.
Read MoreIn this low interest, yield hungry environment, only one thing matters for most investors in Telstra (TLS), and that’s the dividend. It’s again 28c for the financial year to June, but more importantly it could increase next year, with the interim announcement next February.
Read MoreAnother messy result from Rio Tinto for the six months to June 30, with more write-offs which reduced the already weak pre-tax earnings figures; a decision to abandon trying to sell its weakest aluminium assets; with the only good news, another lift in dividend to keep shareholders happy.
Read MoreMarkets in Australia were left a trifle confused by the combination of weak jobs data for July, and reasonable trade data from China for the same month.
Read MoreIt will have little meaning for most Australian investors, but the first annual results of the newly created 21st Century Fox Group of Rupert Murdoch clearly shows why he ended up driving the split in his empire into a content business and the old, analogue print business (with Australian pay TV assets) called News Corporation.
Read MoreThe slow recovery in the housing sector continued in June, but it was mostly driven by people wanting finance to buy existing homes, rather than by people wanting to build or buy new homes.
Read MoreShares in consumer finance group FlexiGroup (FXL) didn’t find the weak retail environment, especially for consumer electricals such as computers, a barrier to improving 2012-13 earnings.
Read MoreA reborn company in Downer EDI (DOW) yesterday with a strong rise in profit, but it faces more woes in the year ahead in its mining services business, and not the usual headaches usually found in its rail contract to supply Waratah passenger train sets to the Sydney suburban system.
Read MoreAs expected, the Reserve Bank cut interest rates by 0.25% to a new low of 2.50% yesterday and left us up in the air about whether there might be another one.
Read MoreDespite the expected dip in profits in the year to June, shareholders in Cochlear Ltd (COH) will receive a slightly higher final dividend, on top of the raised interim.
Read MoreIntegrated Research Limited (IRI) is a virtually unknown – by investors, that is – Australian tech success story. IRI is a software company that develops and supplies performance monitoring, diagnostics and reporting software for business-critical computing and Unified Communication (UC) networks.
Read MoreVirgin Australia (VAH) yesterday presented investors with the bill for its aggressive expansion plan and marketing blitz and it wasn’t pretty – a loss for the year to June 30 of possibly $110 million against a profit for 2011-12 of $23 million.
Read MoreAdelaide investment company Argo Investments (ARG) remains well cashed up, with no debt to take advantage of opportunities in the year ahead after reporting a 5% rise in net profit yesterday for the June 30 year, and a small improvement in dividend.
Read MoreIf APA Holdings wants to takeover Envestra (ENV), it will have to make a realistic offer after the initial $1.98 billion share and cash offer was rejected yesterday.
Read MoreMarkets are going to have another solid week, as they shrug off weak economic data, political fears and slowing economies in markets such as China, India and Brazil. But Europe is slowly recovering, the US is doing OK, but will probably do better in coming months and the Japanese economy now seems to be rebounding fairly strongly.
Read MoreNow for one of the more important weeks for the Australian economy and share market in recent memory with the Reserve Bank poised to cut rates tomorrow and a Federal election in the offing.
Read MoreApart from the RBA decision and the slew of economic data (see separate story), the week ahead for the local market will be dominated by the step up of Australian June 30 reporting companies releasing the annual results.
Read MoreIt’s a truism for all the consultants and other experts from media studies who know all there is to know about that the future for TV and the digital world that ‘content is king‘. It is also a truism that free to air TV is dying and will be killed by the internet and the likes of Google and Apple, Netflix and their fleet of apps and gizmos.
Read MoreIt’s not all doom and gloom from the 2011-13 reporting season.
Read MoreThe market loved the move by Amcor (AMC) to join the corporate divorce club and try and unlock value by splitting itself in two.
Read MoreA messy first day of a new month yesterday with a weakening dollar, a strong start to trading that was, firstly boosted by a surprisingly good reading on Chinese manufacturing, that was then offset by a second, weaker reading, and then the talk of a bank deposit levy emerged to further confuse things.
Read MoreAustralia will get its largest solar venture after AGL Energy (AGK) announced yesterday that it will proceed with two projects in western NSW, costing a total of $450 million.
Read MoreThe number of gold miners cutting asset values is starting to become a flood.
Read MoreSuncorp (SUN) shareholders are to again receive a special dividend this year, despite a nasty problem appearing in the group’s life insurance business.
Read MoreReserve Bank governor Glenn Stevens again sent markets twitching yesterday with comments on interest rates and the dollar that probably left everybody just as confused as they were before his lunchtime speech about what might happen at next Tuesday’s meeting of the Reserve Bank board.
Read MoreShares in the country’s biggest retailer, Woolworths (WOW) were easier all day yesterday after the release of mixed 4th quarter and full year sales data.
Read MoreSlowly but surely, after years of patience and slow growth, Beach Energy (BPT) is emerging as an oil and gas play of increasing interest.
Read MorePerth-based telecommunications provider Amcom Telecommunications (AMM) has been a market darling for some time – with fairly good reason. In FY12 the fibre-optic network operator racked up its tenth consecutive year of underlying profit growth of 20%-plus. That’s quite an impressive track record, given that the last ten years have thrown up more than the odd business bump.
Read MoreOZ Minerals (OZL) surprised shareholders yesterday with news of a $240 million write down due, in part, to lower copper and gold prices and a landslip at one of its mines in outback South Australia.
Read MoreOn the face of it Whitehaven Coal (WHC) had a very good 2012-13 financial year. Production and sales jumped sharply, and the company moved closer to getting its huge Maules Creek mine to the starting block.
Read MoreNewish Rio Tinto (RIO) CEO Sam Walsh has now raised more than $US1.1 billion from asset sales after the provisional sale of its 80% owned Northparkes copper mine in NSW to China Molybdenum Co for US$820 million.
Read MoreThe US Federal Reserve and a full week of data on the health of the American economy will dominate markets around the world this week – with a real chance investors could see a repeat of some of the instability seen in June as the central bank moves closer to starting to slow its extraordinary spending on buying bonds and mortgage securities.
Read MoreOverseas it’s the Fed and the health of the US economy, here it’s the health of the Australian economy ahead of the vital Reserve Bank meeting next week, and the gathering pace of June 30 financial results.
Read MoreMore of the same for markets this week with the Fed, China and US earnings to set the tone.
Read MoreShares in Sydney- based industrial and retail products group, GUD Holdings (GUD) suffered in yesterday’s weak trading as analysts caught up with the detail in Wednesday’s earnings release for the 23012-13 year which showed a 15% fall in underling profit.
Read MoreOZ Minerals (OZL) cut its full-year gold production guidance after reporting sharp drops in both gold and copper production during the June quarter, the company revealed in its June quarterly production report issued yesterday.
Read MoreMore poor news from the mining sector.
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