Weekly Small Cap and IPO Wrap: Analysts and August end ancient blood feud as markets continue to rise

• ASX Emerging Companies (XEC) index up circa 2.8% for the first week of August
• US Futures slightly higher ahead of US jobs read
• Summit Minerals listed today, raising $5.5m at 20c a pop

The S&P/ASX Emerging Companies (XEC) index has gained about 2.8% this week, closing out Friday at 3.30pm with what looks like a 1.2% lift. That’s a good effort as superstitious and statistically-minded analysts alike agree – August usually sucks.

Here it is, (below) giving the old benchmark a bit of a whack to end the week.

Rebounding global equity markets managed to keep the spring in its step this week, despite the bad blood between analysts and August.

Solid US earnings data and a palpable sigh of global relief that the US Democratic House of Reps Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s drop in on Taipei didn’t result in war helped buoy regional and North American markets.

Keeping the party upbeat was a slightly less hawkish, more philosophical (whimsical) word or two from the RBA, providing a little leg up to rates exposed sectors like  IT, banks telco’s and healthcare, all doing their bit to offset falls in resources and energy.

But don’t break out the optimism just yet.

Dr Shane Oliver says these central banks might canoodle like doves every now and again, but they are still hawks.

In the last week a gaggle of the usual feathery Fed officials made clear the Fed is still a long way from a cup of tea and a nice biscuit.

“The Bank of England hiked rates by another 0.5% and started active bond selling, now expects inflation to peak at 13% and indicated a readiness to do more “forceful” hikes despite expecting a severe recession to start this year,” Dr Oliver said.

At home, the RBA hiked rates by another 0.5%  – four crackers in a row now – and all the talk suggests more are in the post.

“Reflecting the low starting point and the severity of the inflation breakout this is the most aggressive RBA rate hiking cycle seen in the last 30 years, except for the rate hikes that occurred in August to December 1994 with which this cycle is comparable.”

Meanwhile, over in Crazy land, with tonight’s session still in the kitty, Wall Street’s S&P 500 is scratching together a 0.5% gain for the week, as it takes a crack at a third consecutive week of gains.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average has given away 0.4% so far, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq is the outlier, up a small cap-like 2.7% since Monday morning in New York.

US futures are a little higher, but traders are awaiting tonight’s US jobs report to get a head start on positioning as the US Federal Reserve considers which route to take path on the price of money, the cost of inflation and the state of the US economy.

At the time of writing, Futures on the Dow Jones were up  0.3%. S&P 500 futures and Nasdaq 100 futures were 0.4% and 0.35%, higher respectively.

ASX IPOs This Week

SUMMIT MINERALS (ASX:SUM)

Listed today at about 11am AEST, raising $5.5m at 20c a pop.

SUM is a battery metals explorer with four projects in WA and one in NSW. In WA its assets include the Stallion REE-uranium project, the Philips River lithium project, the Gascoyne REE-lithium projects and the Bridgetown lithium projects (under application).

In NSW, the company has the Windfall antimony project.

ASX SMALL CAP LEGENDS:

Here are the best performing ASX small cap stocks for August 1 – August 5:

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

Cobre (ASX:CBE)   has now found, not only a bunch of gold and copper this month, but also added circa 600% to the value of its shares.

Even taking a day off on Thursday for a trading halt, new set of drawers and a pipe, Cobre has still managed to climb by around 120%.

Cobre completed its $7m cap raise at what probably struck investors asa bargain 15 cents a pop for sophisticated and institutional investors.

Cobre says the offer built up significant demand.

Up about 60% this week, ResApp (ASX:RAP) is back. And Pfizer is back for RAP. And it just keeps on entertaining fans of the cut and thrust of big and slightly less big pharma. In any case, this healthcare sector saga is far from a done ditty.

ASX SMALL CAP LAGGARDS:

Here are the least performing ASX small cap stocks for August 1 – August 5:

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