Local shares are set to decline about half a per cent at open this morning, mirroring losses on Wall Street overnight. The Nasdaq, Dow Jones and S&P 500 all experienced a slide, thanks to profit-taking following the recent rally and lower bond yields. The NASDAQ shed the most, dropping .84 per cent.
However, what’ll be most important to investors today will come at 2:30 pm AEDT, when Australian interest rates are almost certain to be kept on hold to close out the year – and through to the next rates decision in February.
In the US overnight, music streamer Spotify announced it‘ll cut 1500 jobs, which is 17 per cent of its workforce. This move is part of the company’s cost-cutting measures. It had already slashed 600 jobs in January and 200 in June. Investors were impressed – Spotify’s U.S.-listed shares surged about 11 per cent, to near its two-year high at $200.46 during the session.
And Nvidia dipped three per cent as the U.S. Commerce Secretary expressed intention to block the export of advanced semiconductor chips to China. Additionally, Bloomberg reported that company insiders have been divesting their stock.
Back home, and Westpac’s facing heat as customer after customer faced around eight hours of disrupted online account access overnight. The bank reported the outage was a “routine technical update”.
The Aussie dollar is buying US 66 cents, Bitcoin has surged nearly six per cent to above the $63k mark.
Copper has dipped more than two per cent, to $3.81.
Iron ore has lifted to $133, Crude oil has dipped more than a per cent to $73.26,
Gold is the interesting one today, it achieved record highs and then suffered a 5.5 per cent fall, shedding more than US$120 in the process. It’s been trading just below $2029 (2028.96).
And natural gas is also down nearly four per cent, to $2.70.