Market Close: For the love of God, NVIDIA, please save the ASX

Good afternoon and welcome to HotCopper’s Market Close for Tuesday of Week 47, I’m Jon Davidson. After Wall Street posted its worst day in a month overnight, no surprise the ASX followed suit with our tech index down over -6% in the final hour of trades. 

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Anybody paying attention is aware we’re in a slaughterhouse session at the moment and it doesn’t appear that pain will dissipate quickly, note the Betashares BBOZ bear ETF is up nearly +13% over the last month. But the one thing that could save us this week is NVIDIA’s earnings.

The multi-trillion microchip giant could make or break the chance of a revival down under; however Peter Thiel’s fund was revealed to have divested its NVIDIA stake recently; Softbank did the same last week, so nerves are high. Gold’s back down close to US$4,000 an ounce as the market also awaits unpredictable US jobs data this week.

Every sector was in the red in the final hour; right now the only real excitement remains in lithium stocks, especially after the chairman of Ganfeng overnight claimed he believes the lithium price could pop +30% through 2026. 

Let’s turn to companies in the green. 

James Hardie popped seven and a half percent intraday after investors bought back into the heavily sold off company on well-received Q2 results for FY26; the company also appointed a new CFO. 

Elsewhere, day trader and true believer oil and gas darling Invictus Energy popped back flirting with 17cps as traders turn their attention back towards the stock; we’re still waiting to hear about what a deal with the Qatari royal family may mean for its gas project in Zimbabwe. 

Finally, Pilbara Minerals jumped on Tuesday to stay above the $4 a share threshold; no doubt a move partially informed by bullish commentary from Ganfeng overnight. 

And so what about the reds?

Artrya Ltd shares sunk over -12% intraday on no news but presumably as traders worry about the state of the US economy, given much of the stock’s YTD strength has come from US revenues – still, 1 year returns are up nearly 600%. 

More pain for biotech, even established companies, as Race Oncology sold off nearly -9% in the final hour even after announcing its expanding studies of its drug bisantrene into leukemia and lung cancer on Monday. 

Finally, Commonwealth Bank continued to sell off on Tuesday, bringing one week returns close to negative -13%. I recently said I didn’t see the price dipping below $155 as share, well, we’ve sunk well past that. The bank is close to having shaved $50B in market cap since its June highs earlier this year. 

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