Last Orders: ASX cooks up a day in the green; but tech drops again

The ASX finished the day slightly in the green but tech stocks fell again.

Small caps out performed large caps with the ASX 200 up just 0.09 per cent to 6,773 points while the ASX Emerging Companies Index finished 0.53 per cent up (at 2,031 points) and the ASX Small Ords closed 0.39 per cent up – at 3,194.

However, it was a bad day for tech stocks with the ASX 200 Information Technology Index falling 1.89 per cent. Other sectors were mixed but none changed more than 1 per cent except health, which rose 1.14 per cent.

Topping the bourse today was Queensland focused vanadium and oil shale company QEM (ASX:QEM) which unveiled plans to get into the hydrogen space.

ANNOUNCEMENTS

The merger between West Australian gold companies Dacian Gold (ASX:DCN) and NTM Gold (ASX:NTM) is almost complete. Today all NTM shares were transferred to Dacian and will commence trading on Wednesday.

Thermal coal play TerraCom (ASX:TER) made its inaugural shipment from its South African operations nine months since it acquired Universal Coal (ASX:UNV).

SaaS-based payroll and human capital management platform PayGroup (ASX:PYG) gave its shareholders guidance for the full financial year – which for this company ends on March 31.

It’s tipping Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) of $20.5 million off the back of $10m in new contracts and 5.5 million payslips and transactions being processed.

Electric scooter company Vmoto (ASX:VMT) signed an MOU with Indian tech company Bird Group which could lead to Bird distributing Vmoto’s EVs in India.

Actinogen (ASX:ACW), one of the few small caps fighting dementia, announced a new CEO in Steven Gourlay. His appointment follows three months during which he consulted to the company and the departure of Bill Ketelbey who quit after 6 years at the helm.

Tracking tech stock Bluechiip (ASX:BCT) received an R&D tax incentive of $1.62 million. This was above the $1.23 million it received last year – a move managing director Andrew McLellan put down to being now able to manufacture 5-10 million “Bluechiip chips” per year.