Sydney, Oct 11, 2007 (ABN Newswire) - The Australian market could cool today, following the US after hitting intraday records the previous three sessions; mining firms could continue to get a lift from stronger metal prices.

On Wednesday the S&P/ASX200 rose 61 points to settle on 6,738, surpassing the record set the previous session; on the future's market the SPI200 is down 12.

Turning to currencies, the Australian dollar has eased in morning trade; at 8:40AM the dollar is buying 89.74 US cents, on the crosses it's buying 105.13 yen, 63.47 Euro cents, and 43.96 British pence.

The full report is available at the following video and audio links.

Video Link

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Audio Link

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Making headlines this morning is Peel Exploration. Shares shot up by 34.62% to 35 cents in late trade yesterday after the company announced it found high-grade tungsten-molybdenum at its newly acquired deposit in New South Wales. The discovery came from the first drillhole Peel has sampled on site. The junior explorer plans to re-log and examine more samples from the site to generate a resource model as soon as possible. Peel Exploration listed on the ASX towards the end of May and has yet to post annual earnings.

Shares in Leighton Holdings were down 0.88% to $56.30 on the ASX yesterday. Leighton subsidiary Thiess has secured an infrastructure and mining services contract for the Lake Vermont Coal Mine in central Queensland. Company officials say the contract covers total mining operations including planning, drill and blast, processing and the maintenance of all fixed and mobile plants. The contract has an estimated value of about $500 million. Leighton Holdings earnings have been rising since 2004.

And briefly, Rio Tinto has confirmed that Alcan president and chief executive Dick Evans will head up its aluminium division after Rio's takeover of Alcan.

To international markets, US markets were mixed; the Dow Jones Industrials shed 86 points and the S&P lost 3 points after some disappointing quarterly results, but the Nasdaq composite was up 8 after a strong showing from a major retailer.

European shares were mixed; London's FTSE was up 18; Paris was down 23, and Frankfurt closed 6 points firmer for the second day in a row.

To Asia, where Hong Kong's Hang Sang increased 341; Tokyo's Nikkei gained 18; and China's SSE Composite advanced 56.

Back to the US, gold futures finished higher gaining $2.90 to $746 US an ounce for the spot contract on Comex, Silver rallied 9 cents to $13.67, and copper gained 8 cents to $3.69.

And finally, oil added $1.04 to $81.30 a barrel for November light crude in New York.

Source: Finance News Network © 2007 http://www.finnewsnetwork.com.au

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