Rise and Shine: Everything you need to know before the ASX opens

Good morning everyone, and welcome to Thursday 19 October, a date that is infamous for a few different reasons, not least of which is a weird one.

On this day in 1874, Mary Elizabeth Walsh and Charles M. Colton got married – itself not an entirely unusual thing – but the choice of venue was quite spectacular, and sparked a trend that lasted more than a decade.

Walsh and Cotton were married on a hot air balloon, floating high in the sky above a crowd of more than 1,000 people in Cincinnati, Ohio which included the pair’s employer (and probable reason for the outlandish wedding), Mr PT Barnum.

It was in all the papers, and so loads of people decided that it looked interesting and whimsical enough to copy the idea, but 14 years later balloon weddings fell rapidly out of favour.

In 1888, in front of more than 40,000 gawping idiots, Margaret Buckley and Edward T. Davis got hitched in a balloon above the Rhode Island State Fair, before floating away to an airborne honeymoon.

Later that evening, the balloon crashed in a swamp, and suddenly all the gloss of balloon weddings was lost.

Today is also the 36th anniversary of Black Monday, when the global economy got kicked square in the nards and Wall Street’s Dow Jones index fell 22% in a single session… but we don’t like to talk about that around here.

Both of those events are solid reminders that the future can be a terrifying thing, unless you have a plan for any disaster that might occur.

Which is why it’s important to keep abreast of major developments, especially around your investment.

Lucky for you, we’re on the case, with articles like Josh Chiat’s tireless efforts to understand what Rio Tinto’s currently up to, and Eddy Sunarto’s explainer on why Goldman Sachs won’t budge on its opinion of three Aussie companies despite the drama around Ozempic.

And for those among you with helplessly short attention spans like mine, here’s all the fiddly data and digits to get you up to speed this morning as well.

COMMODITY/FOREX/CRYPTO MARKET PRICES

Gold: US$1,947.86 (+1.30%)

Silver: US$22.86 (+0.18%)

Nickel (3mth): US$18,593/t (-0.05%)

Copper (3mth): US$7,970.50/t (-0.08%)

Oil (WTI): US$88.24 (+1.82%)

Oil (Brent): US$91.39 (+1.66%)

Iron 62pc Fe: US$119.01/t (-0.25%)

AUD/USD: 0.6338 (+0.56%)

Bitcoin: US$28,304 (-0.55%)

WHAT GOT YOU TALKING

ASX-listed health stocks are weathering a bumper crop of chaos at the moment, but this wrap up of who’s done super-well this week should have everyone feeling much better:

Noxopharm up 50pc on mRNA vaccine study
Starpharm up 25pc on Phase 2 results
Imagion reports top line on breast cancer study
AFT Pharma gets second FDA approval this year https://t.co/A6F9az2S9v

— Stockhead (@StockheadAU) October 18, 2023

YESTERDAY’S ASX SMALL CAP LEADERS

Here are the best performing ASX small cap stocks:

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Yesterday’s Small Caps highlights were:

Income Asset Management Group (ASX:IAM) went and merged with Tactical Global Management (TGM), a company in which IAM already held a 25% stake, and Alpha Vista Financial Services (AVFS).

TGM and AVFS have advised that they will be ‘undertaking a strategic merger that combines their complementary intellectual property and leverages AVFS’ AI capabilities and TGM’s 25 years of asset management experience’.

TGM shareholders will receive a 10% equity stake in the merged entity, resulting in the Group holding 2.5% of that entity. In time, TGM can earn additional equity in the merged entity and cash bonuses, subject to performance hurdles.

Noxopharm (ASX:NOX) enjoyed a morning launch even Elon Musk would’ve been pleased with, adding some 50% before lunchtime after new data shows that SOF-VAC, its proprietary asset, significantly reduces mRNA-driven inflammation in animal testing.

In the animal study, inflammation was reduced by around 50% when comparing the inflammation induced by mRNA alone, versus mRNA plus SOF-VAC.

This is an important finding, says NOX, as many side effects of mRNA vaccines are due to inflammation.

The company added that the ability of SOF-VAC to reduce the inflammatory side effects of mRNA has several potential benefits.

Chilean state copper titan Codelco had been eyeing a deal with Lithium Power International (ASX:LPI) in what looks a great deal for LPI shareholders.

LPI has now confirmed it’s entered into a binding scheme implementation deed with Corporación Nacional del Cobre de Chile (Codelco). It’s a deal that will see Codelco acquire 100% of LPI’s issued capital, valuing the company at approximately A$385 million.

Prospect Resources (ASX:PSC) also jumped this morning after reporting a significant new discovery from the Phase 3 diamond drilling programme at its Step Aside Lithium Project in Zimbabwe.

Two scout drill holes returned wide intercepts of strongly mineralised pegmatite from shallow depths, with hole CDD055 returning assays showing 23.08m at 1.03% Li2O from 45m, including 11m at 1.51% Li2O from 54m.

YESTERDAY’S ASX SMALL CAP LAGGARDS

Here are the worst performing ASX small cap stocks:

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TRADING HALTS

Whitehaven Coal (ASX:WHC) – Pending an announcement of WHC’s involvement in the sale of Daunia and Blackwater coal mines by BHP Mitsubishi Alliance.

Talisman Mining (ASX:TLM) – Pending an announcement in relation to exploration results at the Lachlan Project in NSW.

Dart Mining (ASX:DTM) – Pending the release of a placement announcement.

Stellar Resources (ASX:SRZ) – Pending announcement of a capital raising.

Estrella Resources (ASX:ESR) – Pending announcement of a capital raising.

Paterson Resources (ASX:PSL) – Pending an announcement of exploration results of drilling program at the Grace Project.