Australian Market Report of August 6, 2010

The Australian stock market opened lower today after poor signals on the US jobs market sent Wall Street slightly lower overnight.

In early trade, S&P/ASX200 index was down 0.24 per cent, at 4555.4 points, while All Ordinaries index had fallen 0.21 per cent, to 4575.2 points.

In economics news, the Australian Bureau of Statistics released the House Price Indexes of Eight Capital Cities this week. According to the statistics, established house prices in Sydney and Melbourne had surpassed 20% in the financial year 2009/10, followed by Canberra (+19.6%), Darwin (+14.6%), Perth (+13.0%), Adelaide (+11.6%), Hobart (+10.8%) and Brisbane (+8.5%). However, home price growth has slowed down on a quarterly basis, underscoring the impact of the Reserve Bank's six interest-rate increases since last October.

Companies News

Mining giant Rio Tinto Limited (ASX:RIO) reported the first half year underlying earnings of US$5.78 billion, up by 125% on the prior corresponding period. Rio Tinto's iron ore division grew strongly compared to the previous half with net earnings up by 113% to US$4.11 billion, while copper division doubled to US$1.06 billion. Rio's strong half year results reflect robust commodity prices driven by the accelerating industrialisation and urbanisation in China and India.

MOKO.mobi Limited (ASX:MKB) announced today that their expansion in the US has achieved encouraging results with over 5,000 users subscribing within the first 2 weeks after launch. MOKO.mobi is a global platform that enables people to chat and share anywhere via mobile or PC. The company is currently promoting MOKO through AT&T's (NYSE:T) user base and later onto Verizon (NYSE:VZ). MOKO has already built a significant Malaysian user base with over 320,000 registered users within 6 months and formed alliances with European companies including KPN (AMS:KPN), the largest mobile operator in the Netherlands. MOKO will also be available in multiple languages including Chinese, Japanese, German, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian and Russian as the company continues to extend its global footprint.

Emerging iron-ore company Centaurus Metals Limited (ASX:CTM) has signed a farm out agreement with Brazilian mining company Mining Ventures. The agreement covers two non-core Brazilian copper-gold projects, one of which consists of seven tenements prospective for gold and base metal mineralisation. Under the agreement, Mining Ventures will spend US$4.25 million (accounting for 90% stake) to undertake three phases of exploration investment and Centaurus will contribute to the future costs (accounting for 10% stake) after the final exploration stage. The agreement will allow Centaurus to unlock value of the copper-gold assets in Brazil while maintaining focus on their core iron ore business.


Related Companies

Verizon Communications
      

Rio Tinto Limited
         

Moko Social Media Limited
      

KPN Mobile N.V.
      

Centaurus Resources Ltd
      

AT&T