The S&P/ASX200 is up today, gaining about 20 points or 0.3%.

The top performing stocks in this index are News Corp on some happy results and Liontown’s (ASX:LTR),  up 5.7% and 5% respectively.

Across the benchmark index – tech stocks led the gains while the material majors, (save for Boral) – took one for the team after carrying the ASX200 for most of the week.

The S&P/ASX Emerging Companies Index (XEC) climbed 0.6% today and has gained 3% over the last five days.

The top 200 index (XJO) got by on just 1.5% for the week.

There we are. Emerging companies and small caps are great.

And just quickly …

The Reserve Bank earlier today released its February Statement on Monetary Policy.

Most of the key forecasts were referred to in the Governor’s recent speech and his Statement following the February Board meeting.

The Wage Price Index (WPI) is forecast to lift by 2.75% in 2022 (compared to 2.5% in the November SOMP) while still “only” reaching a 3% increase in 2023, as in the November forecasts.

The lowest unemployment since the 70’s

The unemployment rate is forecast to reach 3.75% by end 2022 compared to the November forecast of 4.25%- that will be the lowest unemployment rate since the 1970’s.

Westpac’s Bill Evans expects that the RBA’s forecast that – supply side pressures will ease markedly by mid year – “is somewhat optimistic.”

“We are forecasting that underlying inflation will hold around 3.6% in both June and September quarters and headline inflation will hold around 4.2% prior to slowing in the December quarter.”

How did this week’s IPOs perform? 

With a premier gold asset base in the Tintina Gold Province of Alaska, Felix Gold (ASX:FXG) listed on Monday, with MD and CEO Kylie Prendergast telling Stockhead the company is ready to hit the ground running in Alaska.

“We’re focused on a set of really high-quality assets in the Fairbanks gold district in Alaska, it’s basically part of the Tintina gold province – so if you’re a geologist, it’s very famous,” Prendergast said.

“There’s just huge gold deposits there, Barrick’s (NYSE:GOLD) got the Donlin Creek project which is in excess of a 30 million ounce reserve, Northern Star (ASX:NST) are in Alaska, and they operate the Pogo mine, which is another plus 10 million ounce deposit.”

It listed at $0.30 on Monday and is up about 7% to end the week.

Cosmo Metals (ASX:CMO)  is a base metals explorer with a 460km2 parcel in the highly prospective Yamarna district of Western Australia – a region best known for the >6moz Au Gruyere Gold deposit.

Battery minerals-focused Cosmo Metals listed also listed on January 31, a few days after my birthday, and after a successful initial public offering  raised over $5million.

Cosmo is holding the Yamarna base metals project in Western Australia, and intends using the cash to explore opportunities in the shallow Cu-Ni-Co mineralisation as discovered by major shareholder Great Boulder Resources Ltd (ASX: GBR) at Mt Venn and Eastern Mafic within the Yamarna Project.

It too has closed about 7% higher this week.

Then there’s Firebrick Pharma (ASX:FRE) — THE hot new entrant to the bourse, almost tripling on debut after raising $7m at 20c per share.

Firebrick promptly surged to almost 60c on day one. It’s up 187% this week.

The company’s patented nasal spray, Nasodine, targets nasal viruses causing the common cold, with trials also testing its efficacy at preventing COVID-19 transmission. The company is hopeful of having Nasodine approved by regulators later this year.

“It’s early stage stuff but you can’t take away from Firebrick who has raised the money and the share price has already gone up multiple times,” Power said.

“It’s in the attractive space of coming up with treatments for COVID.” So. Attractive.

ASX SMALL CAP WINNERS:

Here are the best performing ASX small cap stocks for the week starting 31 January.

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Up 100% at the time of writing is explorer  VDM Group (ASX:VMG) which put out its quarterly on Monday and … well, its Phase 3 drilling program at the CdB Copper Project remaining on hold due to worsening COVID-19 conditions in Angola, where on-the-ground activity has been suspended for the entirety of the quarter.

But weirdly, VMG holds a 100% interest in an apartment located at 20/15 the Palladio, Mandurah. The lease is due to expire this month at which time VMG expects to list the property for sale.

“The local agent reports that the market conditions are currently very strong, with most properties being sold within 14 days of listing. The property was valued back in May 2021 at around $1.1 million.” So, there you go.

Elsewhere the sub-$5m penny stock Sagalio Energy (ASX:SAN) is up 39% this week after flagging strong December quarter sales revenue.

Another energy player — oil & gas stock FAR Ltd (ASX:FAR) — also nailed it up a bout 75% this week on takeover news, following a bid from Samuel Terry Asset Management to acquire the company at 45c per share.

“The offer is conditional, including on obtaining a minimum of 50.1% acceptance level. Accordingly, there is no certainty that the intended takeover bid will complete,” FAR said.

Shares in the company closed higher than the 45c bid price, indicating investors reckon there might be some more activity to come.

ASX SMALL CAP LOSERS

Here are the worst performing ASX small cap stocks for the week beginning 31 January

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