• Benchmark down 1.6%, small caps 2%
  • Shares dive on surprise size of rate hike 
  • Dateline Resources lifts on 100m intercept

 

In some miserable pre-rate day trade the small caps index and the ASX200 were down 1.5% and 1% respectively as traders waited inn the sidelines for the shape and size of the Reserve Bank’s second rate hike in 12 years.

When it dropped – at double the predicted 25bps – the real fun began, shares tumbling hard into the close.

In a statement the bank’s governor Dr Philip Lowe pointed to higher energy costs.

“(Which) mean that, in the near term, inflation is likely to be higher than was expected a month ago,”

The IT and REIT’s indices fell hardest and fastest at 2.30pm in Sydney, both giving up around 3% by the end of play.

 

China time?

While we’re locked on to our domestic challenges, it’s worth noting that there’s been a bit of a movement on the Chinese tech and equity front.

Overnight, the long forlorn Chinese stocks listed over in the states managed to slip past six week highs, hitting notes not reached since late in March. The Nasdaq Golden Dragon Index closed 5.4% higher after almost nudging an intraday gain of 10% and the word is regulators are done with the slow, brutal study of Uber copy Didi.

Didi shares jumped nearly 70%, before settling back to closing the session over 25% ahead.

With the country re-opening, activity restarting and some stimmy certainly in the post the Chinese tech giants could be ready for a resurrection.

 

TODAY’S BIGGEST SMALL CAP WINNERS

(Stocks highlighted in yellow rose after making announcements during the trading day).

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

Wordpress Table Plugin

The drill program at Dateline Resources’ (ASX:DTR) appropriately named Colosseum Project has tickled the toes of a 100 metre, high-grade intercept of golden goodness.

The share price has gone heavenwards on Tuesday, before DTR lapsed into a trading halt of immense self-satisfaction, as the company goes back to market for some extra follow-up coin.

So good they wrote a tweet about it:

100.6m @ 4.16g/t Au from 79.24m in drill hole CM22-05 confirmed with final assay results including:

  • 19.81 metres of 5.19g/t Au from 79.24 metres
  • 3.05 metres of 13.78g/t Au from 80.77 metres
  • 16.8 meters of 6.76 g/t Au from 112.78 meters
  • 7.6 metres of 12.74 g/t Au from 132.59 metres
  • 4.6 metres of 7.10g/t Au from 158.50 metres

Drill hole CM22-05 assessed areas within densely drilled parts of the deposit as well as areas below the historic resource model.

Dateline’s Managing Director, Stephen Baghdadi says the drilling program proves high-grade mineralisation continues ‘below the historic resource shell.’

“The final assay results for hole CM22-05 are significantly better than we had expected and prove that gold is contained in several of the breccia lithologies,” he added.

As our own Gregor Stronach noted, Rocketboots (ASX:ROC), has at last made some movement more akin to its lofty moniker, jumping 100% following the announcement of the company’s hook-up with Nvidia.  The company is now in a trading halt ahead of a further announcement.

 

TODAY’S BIGGEST SMALL CAP LOSERS

(Stocks highlighted in yellow fell after making announcements during the trading day).

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

Wordpress Table Plugin

A late bolter into the definitely-not-the-winner’s circle was Victory Goldfields (ASX:1VG), which dropped 19.3% over the course of the day, accelerating as the afternoon wore on.The decline wiped out all of the gains Victory had made in the wake of a positive announcement on 25 May, about the completion of its drilling program at the North Stanmore project – despite assay results still on the ‘pending’ side of the ledger.

 

ANNOUNCEMENTS YOU MAY’VE MISSED

While everyone else was busy losing their minds at the RBA this afternoon, Bio-tech risers Audeara Limited (ASX:AUA) announced that it’s been able to toss another cool $1m into the war chest, thanks to a share placement with strategic investor, Mr Hsin-Chieh “Bill” Peng. Audeara issued Peng with 10 million ordinary shares priced at $0.10, an 11% premium over yesterday’s closing price, and says it’s looking into ways to leverage Peng’s “extensive background and network in Asian manufacturing and markets”.

Way out West, (presumably the spot made famous by James Blundell and James Reyne), Estrella Resources (ASX: ESR) has turned up a nice find, seeing nickel-copper sulphides in the first three step-out holes drilled by the new diamond drill rig at its T5 Prospect. The company says drilling at the 100%-owned Carr Boyd Nickel Project, located 80km northeast of Kalgoorlie, is moving fast, thanks to the brand new UDR diamond drill rig managing to cut core at double the rates Estrella’s achieved before.

And one last dig for the afternoon: Megado Gold Limited (ASX: MEG) says it successfully raised $2.4M (before costs) in a placement to institutional and sophisticated investors, made up of 30 million shares at an issue price of $0.08. Megado’s going to sink the funds into its North Fork Rare Earth Project, located in the mining-friendly Idaho Cobalt Belt region of Idaho, where it plans to put to rest those crazy rumours about that particular US state producing nothing but potatoes, or being wholly-owned by the estate of River Phoenix.

TRADING HALTS

Dateline Resources (ASX:DTR) –  capital raising

Babylon Pump & Power Ltd (ASX: BPP) – capital raising

Lucapa Diamond Company (ASX: LOM) – regarding the approval of the VAT Amendment Bill in the Kingdom of Lesotho and its impact on the Mothae Diamond Mine

Rocketboots (ASX:ROC), – capital raising