Wall Street stocks tumbled overnight on a second downgrade of Greece's sovereign debt in a month and Citigroup's capital raising. The US dollar rebounded as investors cut riskier assets. The US dollar index, which measures its performance against a basket of major currencies, rose to its highest level in more than three months.
The Australian share market lost much of its early gains after NAB's surprise bid for the local and New Zealand assets of AXA Asia Pacific Holdings. Woodside's capital raising also gave the market a pullback. At the close, the local market was slightly higher. The benchmark S&P/ASX200 index closed up 8.4 points, or 0.18 per cent, at 4670.3 points, while the broader All Ordinaries index gained 13.5 points, or 0.29 per cent, to 4689.6 points.
SBI E2-Capital maintained Fufeng (HKG:0546) rating at 'buy', and set its target price at 5.98 Hong Kong dollars. SBI E2-Capital estimated Fufeng will record RMB 915.3 million in 2009.
Wall Street broke the four-day run of gains overnight as a higher-than-expected US Producer Price Index in November raised concerns on inflation. Asian markets ended mixed Tuesday. China's Shanghai Composite and Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index fell after China's State Council said it plans to cool the rapidly rising residential property prices in some cities.
Asian investors continued cautious trading on Thursday amid ongoing debt jitters. Most Asian shares reversed to positive territory after some small drops at opening. Yesterday bourses across the region were hit by a series of credit rating downgrade. Japan's Nikkei fell 1.3 per cent, Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index dropped 1.4 per cent, and China's Shanghai Composite was down 1.7 per cent.
The Australian sharemarket closed marginally lower in light trading yesterday as banks were down on concerns that bad debts could increase after interest rate rise. The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 index gave up 5.9 points, or 0.13 per cent, at 4670.60, while the broader All Ordinaries lost 0.19 per cent to 4686.40 points.
Wall Street closed flat overnight after Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said the interest rate would be hold at low for an extended period due to the subdued economy and low inflation.
