Jeff Bezos and brother Mark are headed to space on July 20 with a teenager and an 82-year-old pilot, just days after fellow billionaire Richard Branson made the trip.

Could this be the start of commercial space travel? Maybe if your parents can afford to buy you a ticket.

Fresh faced 18-year-old Oliver Daemen will be the first paying customer on the ‘New Shepard’ after  Blue Origin’s auction winner asked to fly on a future mission.

“Oliver represents a new generation of people who will help us build a road to space,” Blue Origin ceo Bob Smith said.

To Markets …

Wall Street was mixed overnight, with the Nasdaq pulled down by Apple, Amazon and other big tech companies on lower unemployment and higher inflation concerns.

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell told lawmakers he anticipated the employment shortages and high inflation would abate. Yet many investors still worry.

“People are very nervous and concerned about inflation, tax rates and the (2022 midterm) election. Those three things are very much on people’s minds,” 6 Meridian Chief Investment Officer Andrew Mies told Morningstar.

The benchmark ASX 200 index had lost 0.59% to 7,331.60 points by 12pm eastern time.

 

WINNERS

Here are the best performing ASX small cap stocks in morning trade for Friday, July 16:

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The biggest gainer today is Jupiter Energy (ASX:JPR) up a whopping 59% today after releasing its quarterly report which highlighted unaudited oil sales revenue (including VAT) totalling around US$921,500 (around A$1.196 million) for approximately 32,000 barrels of oil.

The company also announced it has completed the approval process to transition the Akkar North (East Block) field int0 commercial production (under Preparatory Period restrictions).

Notably, the J-50 well resumed constrained production on 14 July 2021 and is currently producing ~50 barrels per day.

Jupiter is also working with neighbour MMG on finalising a joint field development plan for the entire Akkar North accumulation.

Mithril Resources (ASX:MTH) is up 24% and Kogi Iron (ASX:KFE) is up 21% – both on no news.

And Victory Mines (ASX:VIC) rose 20% after releasing more results from its third phase 6,000m RC drilling programme at the Coogee Gold Project in WA which have defined the copper-gold trend for over 250m.

Bass Metals (ASX:BSM) rose 20%, as did Laneway (ASX:LNY), followed by Astron Corp (ASX:ATR) up 18% and Mount Ridley Mines (ASX:MRD) at 17% – all on no news.

And trailing the pack at 16% was Norwood Systems (ASX:NOR) who announced a purchase order worth NZD$639,000 from long-term customer Spark NZ.

 

LOSERS

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Buddy Tech (ASX:BUD) was down 44% after completing an equity capital raising bookbuild and receiving firm commitments for a placement to raise A$6.5 million.