Aussie markets have enjoyed a lift this morning. Mostly, anyway. Energy and Materials are down… so let’s cheer them up with a tale of someone else’s epic misfortune, shall we?

Let’s kick off with a well-worn question: Have you ever made a truly terrible mistake at work?

For example… ask an enormously plump woman when her baby is due, or crashed a hand-trolley with $6000 worth of vodka on it into the side of a customer’s $120,000 Porsche – both Very Real Things that your humble correspondent has done in the past?

If you have, then you’d know that horrible sinking feeling that usually hits you square in the guts, like the crippling cramps you get when you eat a poorly-reheated cream-based pasta dish for an early lunch and now you’re both in extraordinary pain and slipping into a dairy coma at your desk.

But even if you haven’t, it’s odds-on that you can imagine the sinking feeling one Japanese worker got on Monday morning, when he realised that the many-centuries-old monk dunny he was supposed to be protecting suddenly had his car parked right in the centre of it.

The Kyoto region of Japan is well known for being home to a number of Buddhist temples, Shinto shrines, palaces and gardens, including the Tofukuji Temple – home to what is widely considered by Japanese toilet enthusiasts (amateur and professional) to be the oldest crapper in the country, dating back to at least the 15th century.

The toilet is so old, in fact, that it actually predates the usual high-tech Japanese bathrooms that the world has come to know and love.

Instead, it is said to have used chanting monks armed with rags on the end of a bamboo stick to achieve the same outcomes as the all-singing, all-dancing and all-cleansing disco dunnies that are the Pride of Japan.

It turns out that the toilet at Tofukuji Temple is so very, very old – and so culturally important – that one man was assigned to guard it, and preserve it, so that thousands of outhouse-obsessed devotees can queue up to see, but not use, the facilities every year.

It obviously came as quite the surprise for the people of Japan to learn that the un-named 30-year-old (who hasn’t been identified out of fear of being kidnapped by an angry mob and given the Sewirly to end all Swirlies) backed his car through one of the backyard Buddhist bog’s flimsy walls.

 

 

We’re not sure whether “Honestly, champ… you had one job” will translate very well into Japanese, but you could probably bet your very last Yen that the 30-tyear-old’s tenure with the Kyoto Heritage Preservation Association is under something of a stinking cloud right now.

For those of you concerned about the effect that this will have on what is clearly a sacred site for many Japanese people, fret not – assessments are already underway to determine the cost (if any) of returning a pit full of 800-year-old monk dung to its former glory.

But now, let’s take a look to see if anyone else has found themselves in the s–t this morning.

 

TO MARKETS

Australian markets opened slightly higher today, following a half-decent drive from Wall Street overnight that saw better-than-expected results from the likes of Netflix push the Nasdaq higher for the second day in a row.

However, just like yesterday, the local Energy sector is looking wan and feeble, like a vegan that’s been left in the sun. That sector is lagging by 0.95%, on a day when the rest of the market is working harder than the imaginary kid I pay to come up with amusing similes for me.

Also, Materials is under-performing, but truth be told, that’s barely even news at this point. It’s down by 0.11%, if anyone cares.

The good news, though, is that the rest of the market is having a pretty happy time of things today, with Utilities (+1.68%), Consumer Discretionary (+1.00%) and Consumer Staples (+1.03%) all piling on the points.

At the fancy end of the street, Pendal Group (ASX:PDL) has pedalled its way into a 5.9% rise this morning on news that its Funds Under Management has gone… down. Huh.

PDL says its FUM has moved from $111.0 in June to $104.5bn in September, but has managed to parlay that into a tidy jump this morning – perhaps by getting a little bit of pre-Halloween witchcraft in.

Also enjoying a boost today is Chalice Mining (ASX:CHN), up 10.6% on news that it has confirmed a major northern extension of the Gonneville Intrusion at the Julimar Ni-Cu-PGE Project in WA, validating the results of a recent 2D seismic survey.

Extensional drilling at the Gonneville Resource has extended the mineralised zones up to ~600m beyond the current Resource, with several exceptional new high-grade results, including:

  • 70m @ 2.4g/t 3E, 0.2% Ni, 0.2% Cu, 0.02% Co (1.2% NiEq) from 638m (JD220W3), incl:
    • 16.9m @ 7.9g/t 3E, 0.4% Ni, 0.6% Cu, 0.03% Co (3.5% NiEq) from 638m (G2);
  • 14m @ 5.8g/t 3E, 0.2% Ni, 0.2% Cu, 0.01% Co (2.2% NiEq) from 689m (JD344, G4);
  • 3.4m @ 4.3g/t 3E, 0.7% Ni, 0.9% Cu, 0.04% Co (2.9% NiEq) from 718.5m (JD332W1, G2);
  • 7m @ 5.0g/t 3E, 0.3% Ni, 0.3% Cu, 0.02% Co (2.2% NiEq) from 570m (JD337, G11);
  • 5.3m @ 5.5g/t 3E, 0.2% Ni, 0.6% Cu, 0.02% Co (2.3% NiEq) from 898m (JD018W1, G4).

Neato.

Feeling the heat (or lack thereof) from the Energy sector this morning, though, is Stanmore Resources (ASX:SMR), which has fallen more than 6.3% this morning so far.

We should probably take a look overseas, because it’s the right thing to do and there’s nothing worse than signing up for Neighbourhood Watch and then not doing your job properly.

(That’s a total lie, by the way – there are plenty of worse things… like driving your car into an 800-year-old toilet. Poor bastard is never going to live that down).

 

NOT THE ASX

Wall Street closed out the day higher yesterday, after a volatile session that saw market jitters do battle with over-sold sentiment, and lust for more money emerging as the winner after a smattering of earnings were reported.

All three major indices ended up in positive territory, Early Bird Eddy writes, with the S&P (+1.14%) and the Dow (+1.12%) neck and neck ahead of the tech-heavy Nasdaq (+0.90%) by the end of the day.

The US market swung from gains to losses back to gains again as earnings reports came out, most of which have raised optimism that the economy isn’t as bad as it seems.

Netflix surged almost 14% after hours as its subscriber growth topped expectations in Q3.

The company added 2.41 million net new subscribers in the quarter, beating the forecast of 1 million as it expects another 4.5 million subscribers in the December quarter.

Another round of bank earnings saw Goldman Sachs also delivering better than expected quarterly results.

Shares in Goldman rose 2.3% after the bank reported Q3 net income of $3.1bn, down from $5.4bn a year earlier but above estimates of $2.9bn.

In Asia, and Japan’s Nikkei is taking news of the desecrated poop hole remarkably well, with the Nikkei up 0.65% despite the gross national loss-of-face among the international toilet-using community.

Meanwhile, Shanghai is off to a sluggish -0.04% start, and Hong Kong markets have opened flat.

At the commodities desk, and it’s almost a carbon copy of yesterday in terms of directional moves. Oil is up 1.16% but gas has fallen 0.56% – and gold (+0.08%) is being outshone by silver (+0.4%) but remains millimetres ahead of copper’s flat showing of just +0.04% today.

And in the Crypto Lab, where nothing ever seems to obey the laws of basic physics, Bitcoin is having a strop and refusing to participate in whatever passes for a rally among that crowd, despite Crypto Whales absorbing vast quantities of BTC at rates not seen since February 2021.

For all the water-borne mammal-on-mammal action you can handle, check out Rob “Call me, Ishmael! Please! We’re worried about you!” Badman’s Mooners & Shakers has you covered.

 

ASX SMALL CAP WINNERS

Here are the best performing ASX small cap stocks for October 19 [intraday]:

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

Code Company Price % Volume Market Cap
AFW Applyflow Limited 0.002 100% 1,042,488 $2,957,608
ANL Amani Gold Ltd 0.0015 50% 348,500 $23,693,441
DEL Delorean Corporation 0.089 37% 1,339,592 $14,021,859
TOY Toys R Us 0.062 35% 4,442,167 $39,645,614
AZS Azure Minerals 0.275 28% 1,579,438 $66,808,180
CPT Cipherpoint Limited 0.005 25% 356,133 $3,316,653
FAU First Au Ltd 0.005 25% 1,508,082 $3,725,644
HIO Hawsons Iron Ltd 0.12 24% 18,649,276 $71,882,136
SW1 Swift Networks Group 0.016 23% 680,002 $7,679,705
SIS Simble Solutions 0.011 22% 620,000 $3,845,995
PHL Propell Holdings Ltd 0.04 21% 149,999 $3,502,397
GED Golden Deeps 0.0145 21% 6,530,377 $13,862,721
MYG Mayfield Group Ltd 0.3 20% 15,000 $22,646,474
ADR Adherium Ltd 0.006 20% 70,000 $12,809,249
DDT DataDot Technology 0.006 20% 83,333 $6,219,347
TGM Theta Gold Mines Ltd 0.076 19% 227,690 $37,555,965
1AE Aurora Energy Metals 0.2 18% 34,400 $20,299,844
LPD Lepidico Ltd 0.021 17% 23,519,940 $118,479,442
HLX Helix Resources 0.007 17% 100 $13,938,875
IG6 International Graphite 0.33 16% 19,875 $25,076,611
AKN Auking Mining Ltd 0.11 16% 7,018,330 $9,469,088
VRS Veris Ltd 0.09 15% 510,000 $40,852,458
1CG One Click Group Ltd 0.015 15% 1,811,951 $7,707,154
DLT Delta Drone Intl Ltd 0.015 15% 557,983 $3,898,522
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In Small Caps Land, something is clearly up with Toys’R’Us (ASX:TOY), because it has continued to clib throughout this morning, adding another 34.8% before being pushed into a Trading Pause at 10.30am, even after responding to a Please Explain from the ASX over why the toy retailer has

Is it a seasonal boost in the run up to Christmas? Has Santa Claus been murdered during a violent Elf Uprising at his North Pole sweatshop, forcing parents to turn to Big Retail for Lego this year?

Or does it have something to do with Throney Technologies taking on a big chunk of the company with no explanation as to why?

Or… have Australian investors reacted en masse to a recent piece by Forbes that talked up the toy retailer inking a deal that will see it have an invigorated presence in 451 Macy’s stores, without realising that the US branch and the Aussie branch are two very different things?

At some point, all will most likely become clear… but in the meantime, TOY is up 195.2% for the week, but is still down 64.7% for the year, and will this madness ever cease?

Meanwhile, Azure Minerals (ASX:AZS) is up 27.9% on news that its latest assays returned significantly higher grades of lithium topping up at 3.32% Li2O, well above initial sampling which returned up to 1.62% Li2O from more than 130 outcropping pegmatites along a 8km long corridor.

And Hawsons Iron (ASX:HIO) has bounced with the gusto of a dropped four’n’twenty at the footy this morning, adding what looks like an impressive 23.7% but which is, in reality, a drop of salty tears in the ocean of HIO woe that has left the Iron digger down 67.1% for the week.

 

ASX SMALL CAP LOSERS

Here are the most-worst performing ASX small cap stocks for October 19 [intraday]:

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

Code Company Last % Volume Market Cap
JAV Javelin Minerals Ltd 0.001 -33% 251,000 $14,181,229
PFE Pantera Minerals 0.1 -20% 60,000 $6,437,640
SIH Sihayo Gold Limited 0.002 -20% 18,911,977 $15,255,320
BFC Beston Global Ltd 0.05 -19% 7,393,603 $53,833,439
ABE Aus Bond Exchange 0.255 -18% 3,165 $12,013,462
YRL Yandal Resources 0.1 -17% 492,781 $13,930,986
AXP AXP Energy Ltd 0.005 -17% 208,050 $34,873,084
DMG Dragon Mountain Gold 0.01 -17% 500,091 $4,724,060
CBL Control Bionics 0.155 -16% 20,000 $9,311,218
ARO Astro Resources NL 0.003 -14% 2,725,000 $17,126,434
SRK Strike Resources 0.12 -14% 5,145,839 $37,800,000
CVV Caravel Minerals Ltd 0.1975 -14% 759,025 $96,412,406
SUH Southern Hemisphere Mining 0.019 -14% 1,125,482 $7,421,191
RDT Red Dirt Metals Ltd 0.515 -13% 2,419,309 $197,537,515
BUR Burleyminerals 0.13 -13% 3,576 $5,148,457
CRB Carbine Resources 0.013 -13% 5,400 $4,729,133
EQE Equus Mining Ltd 0.061 -13% 224,231 $13,078,237
CAD Caeneus Minerals 0.0035 -13% 5,671,487 $21,382,420
SHH Shree Minerals Ltd 0.007 -13% 7,376,398 $9,907,895
MRR Minrex Resources Ltd 0.045 -12% 11,246,000 $55,244,013
LLO Lion One Metals Ltd 0.84 -12% 1,773 $10,508,659
CMD Cassius Mining Ltd 0.031 -11% 203,229 $14,130,932
SLB Stelar Metals 0.195 -11% 17,390 $8,250,000
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