Despite a hefty drop last Friday, October was a positive month for the ASX.

The ASX 200 gained 1.9% – a figure that would’ve been 3.7% but for the sell-off on Friday, October 29.

The COVID vaccine roll-out in Australia continued, going from 27.7 million doses given to 35.6 million.

At the start of the month New South Wales, Victoria and the ACT were still in lockdown but have now exited. And Victoria and New South Wales are even now allowing quarantine-free international travel.

Of course if you want the hotel quarantine experience you could still go to Queensland or WA.

In the broader financial markets, New Zealand became the first country to lift interest rates and our big banks now think the RBA will act next year.

Elon Musk took a break from cryptos to do a deal with Hertz for the latter to buy 100,000 Teslas. And investors have pondered just what to call the FAANG stocks now in light of Facebook’s name change to Meta.

This author has a preference for this suggestion – albeit one that unlike many others require a name change from another tech giant.

 

Here are the top 50 ASX small cap winners for the month of October 2021>>>

Scroll or swipe to reveal table. Click headings to sort. Best viewed on a laptop

Code Company Price ReturnMRoll% MktCap$ Sector
JGH Jade Gas Holdings 0.068 819 $ 36,122,622.04 Energy
VIA Viagold Rare Earth 2 376 $ 166,624,808.00 Resources
KOR Korab Resources 0.063 215 $ 19,949,578.86 Resources
STM Sunstone Metals Ltd 0.067 205 $ 154,699,135.22 Resources
AEV Avenira Limited 0.024 200 $ 16,394,203.54 Resources
LMG Latrobe Magnesium 0.063 163 $ 77,489,598.13 Resources
XTC Xantippe Res Ltd 0.005 150 $ 20,372,822.01 Resources
PVW PVW Res Ltd 0.45 131 $ 29,094,187.50 Resources
CNR Cannon Resources 0.59 119 $ 37,859,763.15 Resources
LDR Lode Resources 0.29 115 $ 10,780,830.60 Resources
AZL Arizona Lithium Ltd 0.089 112 $ 155,032,990.01 Resources
PRO Prophecy Internation 1.15 111 $ 86,837,302.12 Tech
QXR Qx Resources Limited 0.025 108 $ 15,602,333.38 Resources
SHP South Harz Potash 0.17 107 $ 72,096,700.97 Resources
PLY Playside Studios 0.78 105 $ 71,618,728.12 Tech
CXM Centrex Metals 0.098 104 $ 33,801,084.28 Resources
WC8 Wildcat Resources 0.05 100 $ 25,875,000.00 Resources
CAE Cannindah Resources 0.28 100 $ 134,909,315.06 Resources
SPN Sparc Tech Ltd 1.32 94 $ 72,195,108.30 Resources
S2R S2 Resources 0.17 91 $ 29,935,487.82 Resources
MR1 Montem Resources 0.08 90 $ 15,920,939.20 Resources
LIO Lion Energy Limited 0.078 90 $ 22,842,982.58 Energy
ECT Env Clean Tech Ltd. 0.017 89 $ 21,167,133.93 Industrial
IVX Invion Ltd 0.026 86 $ 181,809,081.57 Health
ACB A-Cap Energy Ltd 0.145 83 $ 125,384,168.80 Energy
RVS Revasum 0.68 79 $ 68,815,545.50 Tech
AGY Argosy Minerals Ltd 0.29 76 $ 331,322,001.56 Resources
PIL Peppermint Inv Ltd 0.019 73 $ 37,283,675.22 Tech
AXP AXP Energy Ltd 0.012 71 $ 72,808,142.39 Energy
CRR Critical Resources 0.041 71 $ 41,080,466.78 Resources
CL1 Class Limited 2.92 67 $ 360,828,022.40 Tech
ANL Amani Gold Ltd 0.0025 67 $ 55,163,796.32 Resources
DTI DTI Group Ltd 0.03 67 $ 14,292,340.51 Tech
AFR African Energy Res 0.05 67 $ 32,569,149.61 Energy
STK Strickland Metals 0.083 60 $ 97,305,431.85 Resources
BDC Bardoc Gold Ltd 0.067 60 $ 116,262,244.19 Resources
LKE Lake Resources 0.94 59 $ 1,065,207,347.32 Resources
DCC Digitalx Limited 0.1 59 $ 72,488,214.39 Tech
IR1 Irismetals 0.34 58 $ 14,849,999.64 Resources
ADX ADX Energy Ltd 0.011 57 $ 29,241,492.75 Energy
TNG TNG Limited 0.13 57 $ 156,187,130.00 Resources
INF Infinity Lithium 0.195 56 $ 76,385,103.07 Resources
GEV Global Ene Ven Ltd 0.1275 55 $ 54,860,384.04 Energy
ITG Intega Group Limited 0.895 54 $ 374,394,278.85 Industrial
IPD ImpediMed Limited 0.185 54 $ 269,478,311.04 Health
A8G Australasian Gold 0.655 54 $ 26,244,230.98 Resources
LPI Lithium Pwr Int Ltd 0.43 54 $ 146,483,336.16 Resources
BCC Beam Communications 0.395 52 $ 28,520,121.76 Tech
AOP Apollo Consolidated 0.6 52 $ 173,514,251.05 Resources
BSX Blackstone Ltd 0.695 51 $ 237,990,372.05 Resources
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The top 3 ASX winners in October

The top stock, with an 819% gain, was Jade Gas (ASX:JGH). This company, once known as High Grade Metals, changed its name, recapitalised and focused on a Mongolian coal bed methane project.

It is not the only energy company focused on that region of the world to be a multi-bagger in a short space of time.

The project area is surrounded by Elixir Energy’s (ASX:EXR) Nomgon IX CBM project where drilling has intersected multiple coals despite not defining a resource. Elixir is up 117% this year.

Jupiter Energy (ASX:JPR) meanwhile is focused on neighbouring Kyrgyzstan and several times in the past couple of years has jumped despite having little news.

Last month’s winner, ViaGold Rare Earths Resources (ASX:VIA), made second spot with a 376% gain.

While the company has had little news flow, it is one of the few options for ASX investors looking for exposure to the rare earths space.

In third spot is Korvest (ASX:KOV) with a 215% gain. This South Australian industrial company specialises in the galvanisation of steel.

It shares went on a run in the middle of the month when it gave a trading update. As long as there are no more COVID-19 shutdowns it is expecting its profit for the first half of FY21 to exceed $8 million.

 

Tech winners

There were a higher number of tech winners on the ASX than usual in October.

Prophecy International (ASX:PRO) topped the lot, never looking back since signing health insurer Humana (NYSE:HUM) as a client for its analytics platform.

Class (ASX:CL1) rose after agreeing to be acquired by wealth management peer Hub24 (ASX:HUB).

Playside (ASX:PLY), one of the few ASX stocks in the esports space, climbed as it capped off a solid quarter, completing its first acquisition and recording revenues of $4 million – a figure that has more than doubled in 12 months.

And DigitalX (ASX:DCC), one of the few ASX stocks to offer exposure to the crypto space, rose in conjunction with the rise in Bitcoin.

This company is primarily a reg-tech company but has direct holding in Bitcoin and offers crypto-related funds management services.

 

Hydrogen and health winners

Hydrogen continued to be a hot space for investors with Sparc Technologies (ASX:SPN) jumping after sealing a research partnership with multiple South Australian universities to progress an ‘ultra green hydrogen’ technology.

Two players already in the hydrogen space jumped too. Global Energy Ventures’(ASX:GEV) obtained approval in principle for a pilot-scale, 43t capacity compressed hydrogen ship.

And Lion Energy (ASX:LIO) used the government’s announcement it will boost investment in the Clean Hydrogen Industrial Hubs program to tell shareholders it would be an earlier mover in that space.

In health there were only two companies on the ASX October winners list.

The first is oncology biotech Invion (ASX:IVX) which on October 28 reported solid pre-clinical study results.

It said studies had shown “complete regression of triple negative breast cancer (TNBC) in vivo (on mice)” following application of the company’s INV043 treatment.

The other was medtech ImpediMed (ASX:IPD), which has technology that can monitor fluid status and tissue composition.

It too rose off the back of clinical study data and capped off the month with a $35m capital raising.

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