Shares choke on poor January

Mac Bank offers a quick take on January share market performance today:

A few points of note:

• defensives in health care, telcos and utilities clearly outperformed cyclicals
• but cyclicals are shaking off big returns from last year so those committed to a recovery thesis will re-enter during this correction
• materials and industrials out-performed in relative terms but I expect this to reverse through the next few months as iron ore remains under pressure. In the second half industrials may struggle too as the recovery meme fades
• not much evidence of any move to small caps despite wider rhetoric though this only goes down to the ASX300

All in all, a crappy month! Here’s the top and bottom 10:

That’s a pretty decent endorsement of my own thoughts for 2014, with dollar-exposed industrials like NVT and ICP powering while bulk miners get a caning. Base metals are travelling well too which is premature to my mind but a lot better pick than bulks for dollar exposure.