Market Highlights: More dull records for Wall St and 5 ASX small caps to watch

ASX 200 pointing to a lower start
NVDA adds another 2% as more Wall St records tumble
Base metals mostly fell overnight

Aussie markets might have to wallow in red for a bit this morning, despite more of the same in terms of fresh record highs from mixed Wall Street business overnight.

At 8.35am AEST, the ASX 200 (SPI) futures contract was pointing down by 41 points or about 0.52%.

In New York on Tuesday the trade was tight and possibly even more tepid than Monday – yes the records keep tumbling, but from an increasingly modest height.

Both the S&P500 and the Nasdaq Composite added around 0.1% to the kitty, while the blue chip Dow Jones has kept trimming slim pickings, down again about 50 points or 0.1%.

We’re still watching inflation in the US. Last night it was the Fed Chair J. Powell who did some quality jaw clenching testimony in front of a bored looking Congressional committee, giving little away, as per his brief.

JP said that the Fed’s getting closer to interest rate trimming and expressed some optimism around cooling US inflation, but not too much:

“More good data would strengthen our confidence that inflation is moving sustainably toward 2%.”

This didn’t give traders much wriggle room – considering cuts are baked deeply into portfolios already and the actual big moment this week arrives on Wednesday in New York when a market moving US consumer price inflation (CPI and PPI) report will offer some clarity in the bank’s next thinking on interest rates.

The US banks led some gains for the Financial sector, as second quarter earnings looms for some of the big names on Friday.

Winners overnight – Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Citigroup and Bank of America – all of which jumped around 2% or more.

On the monster tech front Nvidia added 1.2% and Microsoft gave away the same.

Over in Europe, stockmarkets fell on Tuesday, giving back the goodies made last week ahead of the French political showdown.

The STOXX Europe 600 lost 0.9%. Germany’s DAX slipped 1.2% to 18,236.19 and France’s CAC 40 fell again, losing 1.6% to 7,508.66.

In London, where there was mixed fortunes for the resources and energy names, the UK FTSE 100 fell 53 points or 0.7%.

In Europe they’re keeping an eye on Beijing, where next week’s Third Plenum offers slight hopes of some stimulatory economic measures.

Among the miners – Rio Tinto added 0.25%, while Glencore lost 0.6%.

Energy names tracked oil prices lower BP was the worst, down more than 4% after warning of lower earnings in the post, as refining margins tighten.

On the commodities front, base metal prices were generally lower.

Copper futures eased from 1 month highs, down 1% and Aluminium futures shed 1.5%.

Spot gold was trading near US$2,363 an ounce at the US close.

Looking ahead…

There’s no major data releases scheduled today, although in Funnyland the Reserve Bank of New Zealand will drop a decision on interest rates. The Kiwi official cash rate (OCR) is expected to remain at 5.5%.

In Beijing, we have Consumer and Producer Inflation (CPI and PPI) figures for June.

In other markets …

The Gold price was relatively flat at $2,363.57.

Oil prices –Brent crude oil fell almost -1% to $84.89 and West Texas dropped -0.85%.

US Treasury notes were mixed, with the 2 Year yield unchanged at 4.63% and the 10 Year yield up at 4.30%.

The yield on Australian 2 Year government bonds down at 4.19% while the 10 Year yield was also down at 4.34%.

The Australian dollar was at 67.40 US cents, up a smidge from its previous close of 67.39.

The iron ore price fell by -1.15% to US$111.15 a tonne.

Finally, in Cryptoland on Wednesday morning, Bitcoin and Ether are on the rise. BTC adding about 2.3%.

5 ASX small caps to watch today

Bigger than the usual small cap, but watch Incitec Pivot (ASX:IPL) on Wednesday. The fertiliser, explosives, chemicals and mining services conglomerate says it’s pulled the plug on negotiations with PT Pupuk Kalimantan Timur (PKT) for the sale of its fertilisers business, Incitec Pivot Fertilisers (IPF). IPL says the decision follows “careful consideration of how to maximise value for shareholders while balancing the risks of completing the transaction in a reasonable timeframe.”

Clinical-stage biopharma Neurotech (ASX:NTI), says it’s identified “further beneficial improvements” following new analysis on Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) patients participating in NTI’s Phase II/III clinical trial for patients receiving NTI164 (as per the Clinical Global Impression – Severity of illness Scale (CGI-S). Tough to measure, you’d reckon, but NTI says there was a 36% improvement from week 8 to week 12 and 56% improvement from baseline (Day 0) to week 12. “Overall, ASD symptoms present but barely noticeable at 12 weeks for recipients receiving NTI164 (borderline ill) versus significant impairments observed at baseline (markedly ill).”

Catalyst Metals (ASX:CYL) reports FY24 group gold production (which includes the first 12 months of Plutonic production under Catalyst’s ownership) has delivered an annual total of 110koz. Plutonic produced 85koz for the FY24 year compared to 60koz in FY23 – a 41% increase – with only an $11m increase in costs. This has seen Catalyst end the year with $37m of cash and bullion on hand and $45m of available liquidity, while debt has been cut to $8m, from $36m.

WhiteHawk (ASX:WHK) has secured its first ASX100 contract for cyber security services. Exec Chair Terry Roberts says WHK has contracted Tabcorp Holdings (ASX:TAH) for an annual AI-Based Cyber Risk Program subscription. “Whilst Phase 1 revenues from this contract are $70,800, there is an inbuilt ability to add fee paying additional services throughout the life of the contract. This is an important contract that gives us material visibility in the Australian market.”

GreenTech Metals (ASX:GRE) reports that in-fill soil samples at Kobe South have confirmed “persistent lithium soil trend over a 5.5km strike.” GRE says that results for an extensive infill soil sampling program comprising 1635 samples which aimed to build on the results of previously reported reconnaissance sampling undertaken in the region in 2018 and also show Kobe South lithium trend with peak assays of 200 – 467 ppm Li2O in soils.

GreenTech’s Executive Director, Tom Reddicliffe: “We are pleased to see the persistence of well-defined lithium soil anomalies along strike at our Ruth Well and Osborne JV projects. These results are supported by the discovery of additional pathfinder elements which are consistent with other anomalies associated with a nearby lithium bearing pegmatite.”