People were never meant to fly. If we were, the Good Lord Above would have given us wings, or at the very least not built his Heavenly Home just above the flight path, where the incessant roar of A380s makes it very difficult to actually hark the herald angels whenever they start singing.

But because we need to fly, we have airlines – gigantic lumbering corporate beasts that used to provide a well-oiled, semi-efficient and wildly expensive way of spending several days getting from Sydney to London, with the added bonus of a strong possibility of picking up an infectious tropical disease that turns your unmentionable parts a lurid green.

These days, though, airlines are ruthlessly-efficient, almost to the point of being abusively so. It’s the passengers that need to be well-oiled, or at least well-lubed, while we’re herded like bewildered animals into seats that are precisely designed to maximise occupancy by being 15cm too small in every possible dimension, except time.

There is almost no end to airline-based horror stories – but this recent one from United Airlines is a spectacular example of how endlessly aggravating and utterly hopeless the airline industry has become.

Passengers travelling from Newark Liberty International Airport to Denver, Colorado boarded their flight, most likely already thinking about arriving at the far end, happy and secure.

The Boeing 737-900ER was pushed back from the boarding gate, began its taxi to the runway, before being told to wait-in-place because of a short burst of aggressive weather.

The lightning flashed and the thunder roared for a full three hours before the aircraft was pushed back to the gate, where passengers were told they could get out and stretch their legs.

“If you really need to go to the bathroom or stretch your legs, go ahead, but we really prefer you don’t, and we won’t hesitate to leave you behind.”

So they waited a while on the aircraft, before it was pushed back from the gate again, taxied around for another three hours, until a gentle tap on the fuel gauge by the pilot revealed the aircraft no longer had enough fuel to make the journey.

Once back at the terminal, while it was being refuelled, United decided to cancel the flight. Problem was, somebody forgot to inform the crew, or indeed the passengers.

For the third time, the aircraft – now refuelled – pushed back from the gate, only  to taxi around for another 2.5 hours before someone finally piped up, wondering aloud why that flight that was cancelled was out near the runway with a plane full of passengers.

After 8.5 hours of driving around the tarmac to end up going absolutely nowhere, we were gonna tell United that it’s grounded for a week – but it looks like it’s doing a perfectly adequate job of grounding itself without any help from us.

 

TO MARKETS

It was all looking great for Australian markets this morning, with a nice little jump after being spooked by the opening bell saw the benchmark rise as much as 0.5%, before handing it all back to the dealer like a degenerate at a Vegas blackjack table.

As we bumble towards our midday meals, we’re about 0.1% better off than yesterday, but even that’s not looking very solid.

Now, we don’t want to single anyone out or make people feel bad, because that’s not how we like to do things – so let’s just say Utilities is a big fat dummy and needs to do better or we’re going to stop inviting it to things.

It’s down 1.26%, and it’s the only sector that’s moved more than a few millimetres from open today.

That fall has been offset somewhat by InfoTech (+1.02%) making up recent lost ground, while the rest of the sectors seem to have turned up late for work, some blaming traffic and others blaming last night’s curry, which arrived by bicycle lukewarm, an hour late and ‘smelling different from last time’. Ick.

Up in First Class, and it’s Yancoal (ASX:YAL) continuing its charge up the ladder, adding 7.2% this morning to push it past a 43% gain for the month and within a whisker of +160% since we rang in the New Year (the real one, not the fancy-pants money one).

And, everyone please get up out of your seat – it’s time to do the Sayona Dance. Everyone’s favourite swingfest is back on the charts, this time +6.9% because it’s Sayona (ASX:SYA), and that’s just what Sayona does.

The only big dollar baby looking sus this morning is Super Retail Group, showing a 4.9% dip after going ex-div today.

We’re gonna skip the 8.5 hours of runway taxi torture and head overseas to see what’s what.

 

NOT THE ASX

In the US, nothing has happened because it’s Labor Day – that one day of the year where the famously union-tolerant US of A celebrates how worker-friendly it is, by giving everyone a day off except for service industry employees making $2 an hour (plus tips).

If that was any more ironic, Gina Rinehart would be mining it.

Despite the fact that the US had a big “bugger off, we’re closed” sign on the door, Our Boy Eddy was still up early, reporting that absolutely everything in Europe looks like it’s been moulded out of stuff they found in a litter tray.

European sharemarkets slumped and huffed like aggravated French protagonists amid the worsening energy crisis, Eddy says, adding that the The Dax index was down 2.2%, the CAC 40 fell 1.2%, and the FTSE was up 0.1%.

Russia’s Gazprom is still being a dick about the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, which will be shut down indefinitely – conveniently announced a few hours after the G7 agreed to a price cap on Russian oil. Go figure.

Are things in Asia any better? The answer to that is “yes, no and yes”, with the Nikkei weating out a +0.01% lift, Hong Kong being stupid to the tune of -0.36% and Shanghai clearly listening to a different song entirely, up 0.41%.

At the commodities desk, Oil is up +1.42%, but natural gas in down -1.43%, despite Russia ramming a bung in the tip of it’s European pipeline and pretending it can’t hear the phone ringing off the hook from Germany.

Precious metals have climbed nicely, though – gold is up 0.35%, silver is up +1.56% and copper’s not far behind, +1.35%.

In the far-flung galaxy of Cryptopia 8, where the money lies somewhere between counterfeit and fake, Space Captain Rob “I’ve got the Kessel Runs” Badman tells us that Ethereum Classic is enjoying a renaissance, but Bitcoin is up for the day, down for the week and over by Christmas. There’s more to be learned, as always, at Mooners & Shakers.

 

ASX SMALL CAP WINNERS

Here are the best performing ASX small cap stocks for September 6 [intraday]:

Swipe or scroll to reveal full table. Click headings to sort:

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Leading the little guys in pure percentage terms this morning is Resources & Energy Group (ASX:REZ), which stacked on 31% this morning to reach $0.028, after putting out a list of its tenements that’s as long as your arm, provided your arms are quite modest in length.

Outside of the Penny Dreadfuls, it’s Openn Negotiation (ASX:OPN) which dropped like a stone yesterday but bounced like a rubber ball this morning, adding a respectable 25% before lunch.

Having a lot less fun today was Jayride, the internet company that lets travellers compare shared airport shuttles and private transfer companies – a market so niche it’d fit in your wallet. It’s down 16.6% this morning.

 

ASX SMALL CAP LOSERS

Here are the most-worst performing ASX small cap stocks for September 6 [intraday]:

Swipe or scroll to reveal full table. Click headings to sort:

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