Danish architect Jørn Utzon was onto a good thing when he entered an international competition to design a national opera house for a special site on Sydney’s Bennelong Point.

The iconic Opera House building, with its distinctive complex geometric shapes and modernistic style, has grown in the affections of Sydneysiders and Australians alike.

Now the building has been named as one of the world’s most beautiful based on its adherence to Italian mathematician Fibonacci’s Golden Ratio.

The ratio is based on a sequential number pattern that crops up across nature from proportions in the human body, sea shells, to the spiral shapes of galaxies.

Sydney’s Opera House and its shell-like concrete vaults were apparently inspired by sailing ships at a dock near Utzon’s boyhood home in Denmark.

The full run-down of the world’s most beautiful buildings includes two designed by Spanish surrealist architect Gaudi, and strangely Romania’s Parliament.

St Paul’s Cathedral in London is first in the list followed by the Marina Bay Sands resort in Singapore, and another London cathedral, Westminster Abbey is third.

To markets:

At lunchtime in Sydney, the ASX All Ordinaries index was a shade under 7,000 points at 6,996 having lost 8 points in morning trade.

US stock indexes were under pressure overnight. The NASDAQ gave up 3 per cent to close Thursday at 13,116, while the blue chip Dow Jones index lost 0.5 per cent to close at 32,862.

The S&P 500 was 1.5 per cent lower at 3,915 at Thursday’s market close.

“Wall Street ended sharply lower on Thursday, with the Nasdaq tumbling 3 per cent, hit by rising Treasury yields and fresh worries about the Coronavirus pandemic in Europe,” said stockbroker Argonaut in a note.

The price of gold in US dollars dipped $US8 to $US1,728 per ounce ($2,232/ounce), Friday.

Ten-year bond rates moved up again with the US yield up to 1.72 per cent and Australia’s was at 1.83 per cent.

 

WINNERS

Here are the best performing ASX small cap stocks at 12pm Friday March 19:

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Stocks highlighted in yellow made market moving announcements
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Communications technology company Spacetalk (ASX:SPA) leaped the highest in Friday trade on news that Telstra is to sell its Adventurer wearable devices in Australia.

Spacetalk’s wearable device range will be available in Telstra’s retail outlets and online distribution channel in April and can be purchased outright or through repayment options.

Telstra’s strong endorsement of Spacetalk’s devices is expected to lead to an increased market share and sales growth for Spacetalk.

As the operator of Australia’s largest mobile phone network, with 19 million connections, Telstra is an ideal platform for Spacetalk’s devices that include smartwatches.

“Spacetalk is a market leader in Australia in connected smartwatches for children and seniors, providing a practical solution for families to stay connected,” Telstra retail and regional executive, Fiona Hayes, said.

Queensland and Northern Territory gas company Blue Energy (ASX:BLU) took off Friday on striking a 10-year gas supply deal with utility Origin Energy for the east coast market.

Blue Energy will deliver up to 300 petajoules (PJ) of gas to the Wallumbilla gas trading hub from the company’s Northern Bowen Basin coal seam gas tenure starting in 2024.

The gas company earlier signed a similar deal with Energy Australia for 100 PJ and both deals take its supply from its North Bowen Basin tenement to 400 PJ.

Australia’s governement has prioritised off-take deals from Queensland’s gas resources to the east coast gas market which is experiencing supply tightness.

Blue Energy managing director, John Phillips, said “the momentum for development of the North Bowen Basin gas resource for domestic east coast gas consumers continues to build.”

 

LOSERS

Here are the worst performing ASX small cap stocks at 12pm Friday March 19:

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Stocks highlighted in yellow made market moving announcements
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Gold and nickel explorer Errawarra Resources (ASX:ERW) dipped in Friday trade as it published details of its free option issue to shareholders to raise up to $5.98m.

Shareholders on the company’s register on Monday will receive one free option for every two shares they hold, and the options will be exercisable at a price of 30 cents before September 30, 2022.

The company is to issue 19.9 million bonus options under the options offer and the options will rank equally with shares on issue currently.

Errawarra Resources is developing three projects in WA, Binti Binti near Kalgoorlie for gold, Fraser Range near Norseman for nickel-copper, and Errabiddy near Meekatharra for gold.

Uranium company Paladin Energy (ASX:PDN) traded lower after wrapping up a share placement for $192.5m to institutional investors in Australia and overseas.

Institutional investors were offered shares in the company at 37 cents per share, representing a 20.4 per cent discount to its last traded price of 46.5 cents per share on March 16.

The company is to open a share placement for retail investors on Wednesday to raise an additional $26.2m, bringing the total for the capital raising to $218.7m.

“We are delighted by the strong support we have received for the equity raise from a broad range of high quality, domestic and international institutions which, we believe, reflects confidence in this truly transformational ‘reset’ of Paladin’s balance sheet,” chief executive, Ian Purdy, said.

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