Sydney, Oct 17, 2007 (ABN Newswire) -
Aussie shares have posted a slight gain in morning trade after energy firms responded to fresh record highs for oil prices. However the mood has been kept a little sour with financial firms slipping following disappointing results from the big U.S. banks.
At Midday the S&P/ASX200 index is up 17 to 6,709 and on the futures market the SPI- 200's up 3.
In economic news, the economy can look forward to further strong growth in the next three to nine months according the Westpac-Melbourne Institute. The annualised growth rate of the private index of economic activity picked up to 5.6 percent in August, from an upwardly revised 5.3 percent in July and well above its long-term trend of 4.3 percent.
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http://abnnewswire.net/lnk/X0I7H85SIn company news this hour, CSL says its first quarter profit results are in line with expectation but sees a $65 million adverse impact on net profit because of the weak US dollar. CSL gets around 90% of its earnings off shore and if exchange rates prevail to the end of the financial year its will have an unfavorable effect on reported figures but will remain consistent with company guidance. CSL has no plans to hedge as there is no real impact on cash flow. UBS analysts last Friday cut their recommendation on CSL to neutral from buy and reduced earnings forecasts because of the adverse currency impact. Shares tracked higher on the news gaining 3.34% to $102.67.
Travel firm Flight Centre said after market close yesterday it was targeting 15 percent profit growth in fiscal 2008 following good trading conditions so far this year. Previous guidance was of pre-tax profit growth of around 10 percent. The aviation market is notoriously hard to forecast however transaction volume of both travel companies and airlines has been surprisingly positive recently. Shares in Flight Centre jumped 3.48% to $23.19 in morning trade.
Turning now to market indices, the health index is marching higher today, up 183 points to 9,188. CSL is leading the drive 3.34% to $102.67. Resmed and Cochlear are also finding investor favour.
The Financial ex-property trust index is losing ground, 32 points lower to 7,622. City Pacific plunged 10.4% to $3.79 on the back of US mortgage worries. Challenger Financial and FKP Property Group also took a tumble.
And now let's take a look at regional markets, in Tokyo, the Nikkei is down 107 and in New Zealand the NZ-SX-50 is down 2.
Gold is currently trading at $763.10 US an ounce and one Australian dollar's buying 88.76 U.S cents.
Source: Finance News Network © 2007
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