The ASX Today: XJO nervous as Iran War fret (and a lack of any AI stocks) make Australian bourse dull

Good Afternoon and welcome to HotCopper’s The ASX Today for Monday of Week 29, I’m Jon Davidson and the market’s uncertain heading into mid-July as a fresh flare up in the Iran war puts some on edge and the ASX continues to suffer as a bourse without any AI giants to talk about. 

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Brent Crude oil’s back near US$80 a barrel and as higher inflation in the US drives investors back to the US dollar, Gold is back down below $4,100 an ounce again, which means a dull day for our mining heavy stock market. 

Iron Ore remains above US$98 a tonne in Singapore; Copper and Lithium prices also continued to pull back with copper prices down-5% over the last month. 

Both of the big supermarkets stocks were down along with BHP, but Commonwealth Bank shares were in the green in mid-arvo trades up over half a percent. 

Still, despite a bad day for miners, that didn’t stop a resources company from becoming the biggest gainer. Dateline Resources, once namedropped by Trump, has had an apparent win in a lawsuit filed against it by an American environmental NGO that Trump’s Department of Justice has gotten involved with.

The US DOJ have told a court ASX-listed Dateline’s project approval is valid, which caused shares to run hard. Investors don’t appear curious as to why the Department of Justice has gotten involved in what’s ultimately a planning lawsuit. 

Elsewhere, we saw investors continue to poke around the healthcare stocks; both stem cell player Mesoblast Limited and Chemist Warehouse owner Sigma Healthcare ended up in the top gainers boards as of mid-afternoon. 

Inghams Group stocks continue to recover from a recent sell-off when H5 bird flu hit Australian shores but the stock remains down -12% year to date at $2.20 a share.

Trying to divine the night ahead, as of mid-arvo trades, Wall Street futures are in the red with the NASDAQ tipped to lose -1.3% as concerns around the sustainability of AI growth momentum continue to define the current moment. 

Worth noting: after launching on the NASDAQ last week, South Korean computer memory giant SK Hynix saw its shares fall 8% in Korean markets on Monday.  

That’s the ASX Today for Monday, I’m Jon Davidson, have a great night and we’ll see you tomorrow. 

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