Trading Day

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The S&P/ASX 200 Index closed up 54 points or 1.4% today to 3926 points after absorbing the strange end of session rally on Wall Street overnight. In after hours trading, the index is up another 15 points, with Euro markets also pointing to firm opens.

Asian markets experienced falls, with Japan’s Nikkei 225 closing down 1.3% at 8346 points, theHang Seng and Shanghai Composite both closed.

In other risk assets, the AUD slipped slightly and is currently trading at 95.54 cents USD, whilst WTI crude rallied almost 3% and is at $77.80 USD a barrel.

Gold had a quiet day in the Asian session after falling overnight, currently at $1626 USD an ounce or $1701 AUD an ounce.

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Movers and Shakers
A generally green board on the ASX, with all sectors up except consumer staples, the biggest winners energy and materials.

All of the banks were up, with ANZ up 1%, Commonwealth (CBA) flat after rising strongly earlier, NAB up 1.5% and WBC up 2.4%. Macquarie (MQG) was bid up again by bottom pickers, up 1.3%

Cochlear (COH) gained back some of yesterday’s gains, whilst CSL lost 0.22%. (Disclosure: bought some more of the former, sold latter)

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BHP Billiton (BHP) had a rip roaring day – up 3.7% and Rio Tinto (RIO) was up 2.2%, whilst Newcrest Mining (NCM) slipped and Fortescue (FMG) up nearly 5%

Western Areas (WSA) was the biggest winner on the ASX200 today up 12.8%, whilst Bluescope (BSL) excited more monkeys (bottom pickers) gained 7%. The biggest loser was Murchison Metals (MMX) down over 12%.

The Charts
Today’s action was a small bounce off support at 3850 points, seen in the daily chart below:

Daily chart for previous 3 months

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The short term downtrend (marked in red) from the late August retreat from the 4300 resistance level is still intact. This pattern could morph into a small base in the coming days, or continue the meltdown to the 3700-3800 target level.

Placed in a longer term context, the weekly chart below shows the medium term downtrend from the April high. Price action is still gravitating towards the bottom half of the channel and would require a weekly close above 4200 to constitute a completion of the medium term trend.

Weekly chart with long term moving average


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