ASX December Winners: Who’s led the way for small caps in tough month for global markets?

• Little joy for investors in December with traditional Christmas rally not eventuating in 2022
• Meteoric Resources leads December winners after positive metallurgical results at its new Caldeira project.
• Symbio Holdings saw its share price plunge in last month of 2022 after downgrading its FY23 EBITDA

There was not much to celebrate with global share markets slipping in December and the traditional Christmas rally no where to be seen.

After making gains in October and November markets dropped off.  Stockhead’s talented Gregor Stronach came up with a poem to describe the last trading session before Christmas day, which really summed up the whole month.

T’was day before Christmas, and all through the bourse
The grinch and his cronies were out in full force.
Cackling and thieving all value they saw,
Leaving nothing but red on the ASX floor.

Large Cap or Small Cap, the size mattered not,
As the grinch sucked up gains like a foul trading bot,
‘Til the bells of St Nicholas rang in the air,
And investors let out a world-weary cheer.

For the bells mark the end of a bad trading day,
Their ringing and pinging all driving away
The rotten old grinch and his light-fingered friends,
While investors all wondered “is this how it ends?”

And sadly, it is – for the market has sagged,
With very few winners after most shares had lagged
But fret not, investors – you’ve nothing to fear,
As they say in the classics: “There’s always next year”.

The continued themes of 2022 played out in December with investors skeptical as to whether global central banks could put the inflation genie back in the bottle without causing widespread recessions in 2023.

The ongoing war in Ukraine and China’s loosening of tough covid-19 restrictions also had investors spooked. There are concerns the China reopening could further add to price pressures in the new year, plus rising covid-19 cases in the country could further derail the pandemic recovery.

Of the global markets only the Hang Seng finished in positive territory for December while other bourses across the US, UK, Europe and Asia Pacific fell.

There was little Christmas joy for fixed income investors. While bonds rebounded in October and November after the biggest decline in the history of the asset class, they retreated with yields rising in December. 

Here’s how the markets performed in December:

World Equities

Bonds 

Commodities 

Here are the top 50 performing ASX stocks for December:

Scroll or swipe to reveal table. Click headings to sort.

 Meteoric Resources (ASX:MEI) was the clear winner in December after metallurgical results showed its new Caldeira project contains ionic adsorption clay REEs.

“These results show a considerable portion of the target REEs are adsorbed onto clays allowing for recovery by a simple washing process, unlike the case for many REE projects, where the REEs are tightly bound within the mineral lattice or are even in colloidal suspension requiring a much more intensive treatment process,” MEI said in an announcement.

“Meteoric has engaged with rare earth processing experts in the Minerals Business Unit of the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) to carry out future metallurgical test work programs.”

The MEI share price has risen 460% in the past six months.

Amaero International (ASX:3DA) was another stock to feel some Christmas cheer in December after holding an investor briefing to discuss a binding joint venture agreement for additive manufacturing and powder production in Abu Dhabi.

In the briefing, 3DA Chairman and CEO Hank Holland provided an overview of the JV with Rabdan Industries, each partner’s obligations and the path forward.

3DA provides an integrated metal 3D printing research, development, design, prototyping and manufacturing service to aerospace, defence and tooling customers.

The 3DA share price has fallen ~18% in the past six months.

Pancontinental Energy (ASX:PCL) also rose in December. PCL announced on December 5 that the initial exploration period of its Nambia offshore licence PEL 87 had been extended for a second one-year period.

An obligatory 50% relinquishment of the licence area has been waived, leaving the licence area at 10,970km until the expiry of the extended term.

PCL also announced the resignation of long serving director and current chairman David Kennedy. Current CEO Ernest Myers who has been with the company since 2004 has been appointed chair.

The PCL share price has fallen ~20% in the past six months.

The MEI, 3DA & PCL share price today:

Here are the worst 50 performing ASX stocks for December:

Scroll or swipe to reveal table. Click headings to sort.

Cloud-based voice communications software company Symbio Holdings (ASX:SYM) saw its share price plunge in December with investors reacting to downgraded FY23 EBITDA.

The latest EBITDA guidance is between $26 million to $30 million, down from previous estimates of  $36 million to $39 million.

SYM said the revised EBITDA, which is a 25% decrease on the midpoint of previously guided EBITDA, is
largely due to customer action within its Communications Platform-as-a-Service (CPaaS)
division including:

• Several US-based global software companies returning unused phone number inventory in
  Q2 following COVID-related bulk orders during 2020/2021 restoring normal operating levels.
• New deals taking longer to finalise.

SYM said there are ~400,000 Australian phone numbers in the final stages of the contract process since June 30, 2022 and while remains confident they’ll materialise are progressing more slowly than expected.

The SYM share price is down ~57% in the past six months.

The Earlypay (ASX:EPY) share price also fell heavily in December after providing an update on its exposure to  roofing business RevRoof, which has fallen into administration.

RevRoof owes EPY ~$29 million with management management advised that uncertainty has arisen around how much will be recovered.  As a result, it has withdrawn its guidance for FY 2023.

“Earlypay is not in a position to provide revised guidance at this time and will keep the market informed of any material updates as the matter progresses,” the company announced.

The EPY share price is down ~60% in the past six months.

The SYM & EPY share price today: