Ah, Florida Man… you never fail to inspire us, even if it’s only to serve as a reminder that sometimes even the most obvious lessons in life are learned the hard way.

Today’s life lesson: if you’re gonna pat an unfamiliar dog in the middle of a dark Florida night, check both ends of the animal to make sure it’s actually Man’s Best Friend.

The (human) star of this story was staying at the Warm Mineral Springs Motel (dear God, I hope that’s not a euphemism) when he went for a late night wander.

Spotting what he told police “appeared to look like a dog with a long leash”, he went in for a bit of puppy love and got a lot more than he bargained for.

Turns out that the dog was (if the image above isn’t a total spoiler) not a floofy woofer at all, but a far toothier local, of the alligator variety.

Hey! Over here! I’m totally a friendly dog… Honest! Pic via Getty

Not known for their friendly attitude towards being molested by strangers in the dead of night, the alligator did what alligators do, chomping our hapless hero on the leg.

He was found by a roving deputy sheriff and transported to hospital, missing a sizeable chunk of muscle.

The ‘gator was caught by police and “taken away”, no doubt to be murdered and skinned to make a new face for whichever of the Kardashians is looking a bit rough this week.

Anyway, let’s check the Aussie markets for hungry reptiles, and then dive on in…

 

TO MARKETS

Australian markets took their lead from Wall Street (when will we ever learn?), dipping more than 1.0% over the course of the morning, after the Financials (-2.30%) and Real Estate (-1.95%) sectors threw the anchor over the side.

Also giving investors a dose of heartburn were Industrials and Materials, knocking the wind out of the ASX 200 and negating the tepid growth among Energy (+0.83%) and Health Care (+0.39%) stocks.

The big upward mover for the day is Pearl Gull Iron (ASX:PLG), which has risen close to 50% this morning as iron ore prices continue to spike. The company’s been on a solid upward trend since June 3, despite no clear news on how it plans to move any ore it finds off the remote Cockatoo Island.

Mozaic Brands (ASX:MOZ) bounced this morning, after yesterday’s completely-not-excellent announcement that the company has underperformed and will post a loss for FY22. Shares rose ~30%, but not enough to offset yesterday’s gruesome slump.

And leading the losses up in the nosebleed seats was Sayona Mining (ASX:SYA), compounding yesterday’s poor results with a further decline of ~9.3%. Sayona is down more than 22% for the week, and more than 50% for the month, as investors filed out the fire exits.

Overseas, and Wall Street gave back a chunk of yesterday’s gains, as Treasury yields and ponderous oil price increases weighed heavily on investor confidence.

The S&P led the downward charge (-1.08%), with the Dow (-0.81%) and the Nasdaq (-0.73%) in tow.

Asian markets were flatter than Nullarbor roadkill, barely managing to move the needle as we headed towards lunch. Japan was up +0.09%, Shanghai down (-0.02%) and Hong Kong shares were smooth as eggs, 0.00%.

Oil prices were up a little bit (+0.02%), gold dipped again (-0.18%) and the Aussie dollar fell (-0.4%) against a steady US dollar.

 

ASX SMALL CAP WINNERS

Here are the best performing ASX small cap stocks for June 9 [intraday]:

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Among the rest of the small caps putting on weight was Internet of Things developer Zimi (ASX:ZMM), which has continued to climb following its end of May announcement about expanding its product range.

Other gains of note include Race Oncology (ASX:RAC) (+17%), and one of yesterday’s better perfomers, and Adavale Resources (ASX:ADD), which added another 16% to its price before lunchtime.

 

ASX SMALL CAP LOSERS

Here are the worst performing ASX small cap stocks for June 9 [intraday]:

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