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We mightn’t have climbed as high into the 8,800pts as this finance journalist would have liked (given his exposure to leveraged index ETFs) but it was a good end to Week 42 of the year with the ASX200 (XJO) up +1.12% a/a 3.05pm AEDT winding down into the final hour of trade.
It’s a good end to a rickety week: we’ve experienced quite a bit of broad volatility as US inflation came in hotter than expected, though, we also got hotter-than-expected unemployment data in Australia which also informed investment decisions.
But that the ASX has bounced back after a relatively tame night for the S&P500 and NASDAQ is by all means a good way to end the week – not forgetting of course that anything can happen over the weekend.
The ASX200 is up +1.18% over the last week with most of those gains brought about today; the bourse is up 1.6% over the last month. IT stocks bounced back in Australia today which was largely driven by a +9% jump in Weebit Nano shares after ASIC yesterday dropped its investigation into founder Richard White.
That appeared to spark goodwill all-across the tech sector down under, even after a brutal sell off in chip stocks on Korea’s KOPSI, which spread to Wall Street, originally borne from fears around China’s CXMT’s claims it’s developed next-gen microchip tech on its own, getting around tariffs and other barriers.
Over the last month, the tech index (XTX) is up +2.3%; over the last year it’s lost -40% and YTD it’s down -22% – one must factor in Wisetech’s troubled past in making sense of those numbers (as well as contagion risk from the NASDAQ, felt multiple times this week.)
The Materials sector also bounced back on Friday, though, over the last week, it’s still down -2.7% and down -2% over the last month. YTD, materials has gained +9%. (Through FY26, the index jumped +40% vs FY25 as copper became BHP’s core focus and gold remained of foremost interest through 1HC25.)
So what will tonight on the US session bring? I’m not going to act like I know – it’s all too volatile to guess right now, but a fairly strong Q3 US earnings season seems to be keeping things afloat and stopping the latest chip panic from tanking the market.
Until Monday!
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