Billabong Battered
An appalling day if you happened to be a remaining shareholder in Billabong – the shares lost 58% of their already very diminished value after the sale of the company to possible US buyers fell over.
Read MoreAn appalling day if you happened to be a remaining shareholder in Billabong – the shares lost 58% of their already very diminished value after the sale of the company to possible US buyers fell over.
Read MoreSuddenly the going is getting tougher in our biggest export markets of China, South Korea, India and Taiwan – in fact it seems that apart from rebounding Japan, the rest of Asia is now seeing a slowdown in activity in its most important sector – manufacturing.
Read MoreBlood on the share price of Cochlear (COH), the hearing implant company, after a disappointing earnings and sales update yesterday.
Read MoreA somewhat confusing, but busy morning yesterday for waste handling group, Transpacific Industries (TPI) and its management, board and investors.
Read MoreAmid all the hype and type about quantitative easing, Fed easing/tightening, falling gold, oil, nervous investors and rising bond yield, there was an unlikely winner of the best performed major stock market last month – China.
Read MoreThe health of the Australian economy, interest rates, retail sales, trade and growth will be centre stage in the coming week, as will US employment, European interest rates, the health of manufacturing in major economies, while Chinese economic data for May is out next weekend.
Read MoreNervous May might have become June on Saturday, but that won’t have an impact on the local market opening.
Read MoreOZ Minerals’ shares look like ending the week above $4, and off the back of a sharp dip under that level during the week, after Tuesday’s AGM. The shares ended at $4.05 yesterday, compared with a $4.06 close last Friday.
Read MoreThe slowdown of the mining and resource investment boom seems to be happening faster than previously thought.
Read MoreShould we start fearing Thursday trading on the Tokyo stock market?
Read MoreWe saw a couple of results yesterday that went against the current gloomy trend. Programmed Maintenance Services nudged profit up 3% for the year to March 31 and lifted dividends, and Aristocrat Leisure seems to be getting back on track with higher interim earnings and dividends.
Read MoreAnd a reasonable update from building and communications service company BSA Limited, despite weak underlying conditions in the markets it operates in.
Read MoreAnd although the 3% rise in full year earnings by Programmed Maintenance Services (PRG) was modest, it still was a rise, which is what a lot of its competitors in the services sector will struggle to report for the 2012-13 financial year.
Read MoreSoul Pattinson’s resource subsidiary New Hope Corp (NHC) has again cut coal output further at its West Moreton operations in Queensland because of the continuing weakness in the global coal market.
Read MoreSantos (STO) has nailed the silly argument from The Greens and the Australian Industry Group that we face a gas shortage in the Eastern States in coming years because the rising level of exports, especially by the Queensland coal seam gas sector.
Read MoreBrisbane-based Suncorp (SUN) told an investors day briefing that it is now targeting what it calls "top line growth" of 7% to 9% over the next couple of years and wants to boost return on equity to 10% by 2015.
Read MoreShould David Jones’s (DJS) latest third quarter figures, out yesterday, make investors reassess the performance of Myer?
Read MoreBrisbane-based tech group Technology One (TNE) has lifted interim dividend by 10% after a 17% improvement in first half earnings, but the shares closed all but steady on the day.
Read MoreProperty firm GPT Group has abandoned its bid to buy Australand Property Group’s industrial and investment property portfolio, worth an estimated $A2.8 billion.
Read MoreMore of the same uncertainty for another week?
Read MoreLate last Friday afternoon, the small WA industrial products company Coventry Group (CYG) became the latest in the growing list of profit downgrades when it issued a market update that warned that net earnings would more than halve to around "$6 million" for the year to June.
Read MoreAnother week when the health of the fading Australian resources investment boom will be again tested, as well as the Chinese economy; local building approvals will get a run, and offshore the second estimate of US first quarter economic growth will be released, along with the usual monthly economic figures from Japan on employment, retail sales and inflation.
Read MoreI dragged out the soapbox not too long ago to highlight some of the hypocrisy and ignorance surrounding algorithmic trading, and particularly high frequency trading. Today, it’s time to shine the light on dark pools. While we’re at it, it seems a good time to look at the real responsibility politicians hold for economic outcomes.
Read MoreA weak manufacturing report from China, worries about the future of the US Fed’s easing program, job losses at Ford and other companies and a general unease with the economy combined to knock more than $A30 billion off the value of local shares yesterday and rattled European markets overnight as well.
Read MoreA bad day for jobs yesterday that will test the resilience of the country’s labour market that has so far shown unusual strength in 2013, with more than 95,000 jobs created in the first four months of the year.
Read MoreThe quarterly and annual result from building products group James Hardie was one of those good bits/bad bits results. Earnings were solid, dividend is unchanged and a share buyback has been renewed.
Read MoreBut for cement group Adelaide Brighton (ABC) weakness in the construction sector meant bad news for shareholders at yesterday’s AGM.
Read MoreThe slowdown in the mining sector here and offshore has seen consultants, Cardno Ltd (CDD), join the growing list of service companies reporting damage to revenue and earnings.
Read MoreIf the weakening gold price and production problems at some of its mines were not enough, Newcrest (NCM), the country’s biggest gold miner, now faces a serious legal situation that could threaten its hold on its huge, $2 billion Cadia mine in central Western NSW.
Read MoreCaution, yes in Myer’s (MYR) third quarter sales update yesterday, but none of the bad news we have seen from fellow retailers, Target and Fantastic about weak sales, falling profits or a lack of buyers.
Read MoreStill in retailing and Thorn Group (TGA), the rental and credit provider has reported flat earnings at $28 million, despite recording a record level of rentals and revenue in the year to March 31.
Read MoreAnd the downgrades continued yesterday with Fantastic Holdings Ltd (FAN), the country’s third biggest furniture retailer, revealing a sales and earnings fall that could cut net profits for the 2012-13 year by more than 30%. That could threaten the final dividend for the year as well.
Read MoreTransfield Services (TSE) and Boart Longyear (BLY) both warned yesterday of the damage the uncertainty from the slide in activity in the mining sector and other parts of the economy was doing to their revenues and earnings.
Read MoreThe Minutes of Reserve Bank’s May 7 meeting that produced the surprise cut in interest rates make clear that the high value of the dollar had nothing to do with the decision – despite reports in the media and from business economists to the contrary.
Read MoreWill GPT now turn its attention to making a firm, higher offer for the investment, commercial and industrial property assets of Singapore-controlled Australand after selling its half share in the Erina Fair shopping mall on the NSW central Coast for $397 million?
Read MoreBelieve it or not, but Leighton Holdings, the country’s major contractor, reckons its looking to Asia to find new sources of sustainable growth. That’s despite the region being its earliest offshore area for growth, especially in Hong Kong and Indonesia.
Read MoreContractor, Coffey International, has been forced to issue a further statement after its earnings downgrade a week ago – this time it’s to reassure investors that it is not in trouble with its bankers.
Read MoreEvery now and then you see the smarties in the stock market outsmarted by someone else, usually themselves.
Read MoreAs usual these days, central banks here and the in the US will dominate much of the week, thanks to the minutes of the May 7 board meeting of the Reserve Bank which produced that surprise cut in the cash rate, and then the appearance Wednesday night of Federal Reserve chairman, Ben Barnanke.
Read MoreSo what’s fallen fastest in the past couple of weeks or so – gold or the Aussie dollar? The answer is clear – both have surprised on the downside. Not for their weakness – that has been apparent for a while, but for the speed of the fall.
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