Bong. Bong. Bong. Bong. Market's closed because everyone's too stoned. Pic via Getty Images.
CLOSING BELL: It’s the sound the market makes at the end of the day… dingaling
News
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- The benchmark looks like it’s been working hard, but really not much has changed
- Turaco Gold hits solid results, goes up $0.01 (which is actually 17.2%, so that’s a good thing)
- I don’t know why there has to be 3 bullet points. When I was a boy, we only ever got 2, but we were grateful.
It’s the end of another grindy-old Tuesday – one which has seen the ASX benchmark worm its way around to a 0.3% dip thanks to Wall Street coughing a bag of mixed weirdness overnight.
Chalk that up to a couple of gasbags from the US Fed who took to monologuing about The Future of Money or something like that, which caused heartburn and hair loss among investors in the US.
That, of course, meant that local investors were coming into the day with a sour taste on their lips already, so of course the market was acting funny all day.
We saw stuff like inexplicable surges on volume so thin it’s in danger of being harvested to build some fancy new apartment walls in Sydney’s CBD, that sort of thing… but there were some improvements over how the overall market was looking at lunch time, even if the end result doesn’t really show it.
For instance, the Telcos and both Consumer sectors were able to lift their game between lunch time and beer o’clock, ending the day at +0.32%, +0.17% (Discretionary) and +0.01% (Staples).
The rest of the sectors closed out the day in the red, with Industrials (-0.63%) and Utilities (-0.56%) taking the worst of the beating.
The afternoon saw a late charge by big gun Polynovo (ASX:PNV), which saw the Healthcare company climb to +8.0% over its closing price yesterday on zero immediately apparent news.
PNV has been on a bit of a climbing streak for a while now, moving from $1.805 on 20 December 2022 to hit today’s recent high of $2.485, up more than 27% for the month.
As was the case this morning, there were a few Large Caps losing ground today, starting with diggers Arafura Rare Earths (ASX:ARU), down 10.0% on no real news and De Grey (ASX:DEG), which has fallen sharply by 8.25% today.
De Grey’s drop this morning ends a solid gain streak that began at $1.26 on 29 December last year, after hitting a peak at $1.575 at close last night – a +20% run that’s been snapped at an unfortunate time for the company’s newest non-executive director.
DEG announced this morning that Business Advisor and Corporate Lawyer Emma Scotney had been appointed – but it’s super-unlikely that the news and De Grey’s form slump today are linked.
ASX SMALL CAP WINNERS
Here are the most-worst performing ASX small cap stocks for January 10 [intraday]:
Swipe or scroll to reveal full table. Click headings to sort:
| Code | Company | Price | % | Volume | Market Cap |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| WBE | Whitebark Energy | 0.0015 | 50% | 1,519,354 | $6,464,886 |
| SMX | Security Matters | 0.18 | 38% | 307,598 | $21,828,499 |
| EVE | EVE Health Group Ltd | 0.002 | 33% | 1,258,085 | $7,911,724 |
| SRN | Surefire Rescs NL | 0.015 | 25% | 13,624,230 | $18,976,362 |
| AQX | Alice Queen Ltd | 0.0025 | 25% | 257,961 | $4,400,500 |
| CYM | Cyprium Metals Ltd | 0.14 | 22% | 7,461,612 | $83,972,805 |
| M24 | Mamba Exploration | 0.18 | 20% | 357,784 | $6,326,250 |
| OLY | Olympio Metals Ltd | 0.15 | 20% | 75,915 | $4,899,565 |
| OAR | OAR Resources Ltd | 0.006 | 20% | 369,998 | $12,055,189 |
| MVL | Marvel Gold Limited | 0.026 | 18% | 143,010 | $15,498,876 |
| BUY | Bounty Oil & Gas NL | 0.007 | 17% | 815,173 | $8,223,006 |
| LIO | Lion Energy Limited | 0.036 | 16% | 282,524 | $13,209,417 |
| OPL | Opyl Limited | 0.029 | 16% | 1,456,468 | $1,601,301 |
| TNY | Tinybeans Group Ltd | 0.225 | 15% | 16,560 | $11,970,164 |
| LYK | Lykos Metals | 0.115 | 15% | 28,266 | $6,240,000 |
| NGL | Nightingale Intel | 0.115 | 15% | 115,101 | $9,674,871 |
| GRL | Godolphin Resources | 0.092 | 15% | 142,600 | $9,469,556 |
| TRJ | Trajan Group Holding | 2.06 | 14% | 61,780 | $273,745,557 |
| INP | Incentiapay Ltd | 0.008 | 14% | 51,117 | $8,855,445 |
| KZA | Kazia Therapeutics | 0.12 | 14% | 545,399 | $17,157,942 |
| SRR | Sarama Resources | 0.12 | 14% | 70,500 | $3,968,159 |
| CNQ | Clean Teq Water | 0.45 | 14% | 128,429 | $22,795,568 |
| MMI | Metro Mining Ltd | 0.017 | 13% | 3,337,894 | $65,457,445 |
| C6C | Copper Mountain | 2.26 | 13% | 215,361 | $33,533,292 |
| AL8 | Alderan Resource Ltd | 0.009 | 13% | 538,372 | $4,626,129 |
In the Wonderful World of Small Caps, Cyprium Metals (ASX:CYM) is up 21.7% on solid volume, as it beavers its way through Phase 1 of the Nifty Copper Project Restart.
Cyprium recently announced an offtake agreement for about 100% (~140,000 tonnes) of the Copper Cathode produced during Phase 1 of the restart, alongside a US$35M Secured Offtake Prepayment Facility through Transamine SA.
Turaco Gold (ASX:TCG) has gone soaring this morning off the back of a major gold hit, after the company revealed a highlight 26m @ 4.82g/t gold from 35m at the Satama discovery in Côte d’Ivoire, where the company says the zone of high-grade mineralisation remains open in all directions.
By the end of the day, TCG had added an entire $0.01c to its trading price – which is actually pretty epic, because that’s a better-than-17% rise.
And Copper Mountain Mining (ASX:C6C) is up 13.0% on news that production has resumed at its 75% owned Copper Mountain Mine located in southern British Columbia near the town of Princeton, following a ransomware attack that brought production to a halt in the final days of 2022.
ASX SMALL CAP LOSERS
Here are the most-worst performing ASX small cap stocks for January 10 [intraday]:
Swipe or scroll to reveal full table. Click headings to sort:
| Code | Company | Price | % | Volume | Market Cap |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| KEY | KEY Petroleum | 0.001 | -33% | 301,000 | $2,951,892 |
| ROO | Roots Sustainable | 0.0015 | -25% | 173,010 | $2,078,439 |
| XST | Xstate Resources | 0.0015 | -25% | 183,575 | $6,430,363 |
| IS3 | I Synergy Group Ltd | 0.02 | -20% | 500,003 | $7,227,009 |
| ALM | Alma Metals Ltd | 0.008 | -20% | 709,068 | $9,140,008 |
| MTL | Mantle Minerals Ltd | 0.002 | -20% | 6,000 | $13,364,013 |
| SW1 | Swift Networks Group | 0.013 | -19% | 28,193 | $9,484,747 |
| M4M | Macro Metals Limited | 0.005 | -17% | 48,500 | $11,682,467 |
| AHI | Advanced Health | 0.105 | -16% | 24,323 | $24,506,746 |
| NSM | Northstaw | 0.16 | -16% | 106,033 | $22,824,130 |
| KNM | Kneomedia Limited | 0.012 | -14% | 2,218,133 | $18,952,994 |
| LNU | Linius Tech Limited | 0.003 | -14% | 64,866,635 | $9,909,945 |
| KED | Keypath Education | 0.535 | -14% | 226,704 | $132,419,545 |
| CXM | Centrex Limited | 0.1125 | -13% | 5,404,706 | $79,510,604 |
| PGY | Pilot Energy Ltd | 0.0175 | -13% | 9,329,877 | $15,626,882 |
| DRO | Droneshield Limited | 0.255 | -12% | 6,623,309 | $130,802,176 |
| VHM | Vhmlimited | 1.005 | -12% | 1,718,509 | $160,641,250 |
| 1AE | Aurora Energy Metals | 0.15 | -12% | 132,944 | $20,433,478 |
| AXI | Axiom Properties | 0.075 | -12% | 30,000 | $36,780,661 |
| SPX | Spenda Limited | 0.015 | -12% | 3,759,981 | $55,470,645 |
| SIX | Sprintex Ltd | 0.039 | -11% | 99,874 | $11,191,590 |
| CTN | Catalina Resources | 0.008 | -11% | 4,772,845 | $11,146,382 |
| ESR | Estrella Res Ltd | 0.016 | -11% | 2,303,028 | $26,704,294 |
| RDS | Redstone Resources | 0.008 | -11% | 67,867 | $6,631,492 |
| SNS | Sensen Networks Ltd | 0.049 | -11% | 1,236,968 | $37,326,450 |
LAST ORDERS
A solid update from Lake Resources (ASX:LKE) – and a couple of other quickies – this afternoon, because as they say, time is money… and I’m being criminally underpaid considering the amount of ASX announcements I have to read everyday.
Lake Resources has announced that it, along with its tech partner Lilac, has hit a couple of pretty significant milestones recently at Project Karachi, which LKE describes as “a world-class lithium development project that is poised to lead the industry in the production of high-quality lithium with a minimal environmental footprint”.
LKE says that Lilac has successfully operated the Demonstration Plant at Project Karachi for 1,000 consecutive hours and produced 40,000 litres of lithium chloride eluate, in time to meet the December 31, 2022 deadline set out in the agreement between the two companies.
The lithium chloride eluate produced by Lilac is in the process of being shipped to Saltworks and converted to lithium carbonate, after which it will be independently tested for purity – possibly by having an underling stab a package of it with a switchblade and putting some on their tongue, but more likely in a lab somewhere because lithium carbonate sounds like it might actually be a bit on the poisonous side.
“Lilac has proven to be an exceptional partner to work with in our joint pursuit of the efficient and cleaner delivery of high-quality lithium, which is in increasingly high demand by battery makers,” said Lake CEO and Managing Director David Dickson.
“We are pleased with our accomplishments to date and are intently focused on the next stages of this project. Above all, we are proud of the work we and Lilac have achieved thus far to innovate the production of lithium in a way that is inclusive and respectful of the local communities in which we operate, and protective of the environment.”
Elsewhere, Catalyst Metals (ASX:CYL) looks set to move into WA’s Marymia-Plutonic gold belt, through an off-market scrip takeover bid for Vango Mining (ASX:VAN).
Catalyst and Vango have entered into a Bid Implementation Agreement, under which Vango shareholders will be entitled to receive 5 fully paid ordinary shares in Catalyst for every 115 Vango shares held – an offer enticing rough to have around 73% of Vango’s shareholders say “Yep. Let’s do it.”
Based on Catalyst’s closing price on 6 January of $1.205, the implied value is approximately $66.0 million or $0.052 per Vango Share, representing a premium of 19.1% to the closing price of Vango on 6 January, 30.2% to the 5 day VWAP and 33.5% to the 30 day VWAP of Vango.
And that is literally all of the potentially market moving info released to the ASX today since around lunch time – the rest of the list is the boring housekeeping stuff that probably takes someone ages to prepare but hardly anyone else bothers to read, which is a bit sad.
TRADING HALTS
Today, there were none.
However, the tumbleweed sellers at the ASX in Sydney are reporting that sales are through the roof today, so at least someone’s going home with a few coins in their pocket.
