Precious metals took a turn for the worse this morning, with gold slumping to its lowest point since March.
The slump has been attributed to speculation that the US Federal Reserve is likely to wind back stimulus following the release of strong employment data.
Meanwhile, silver has dropped to its lowest since November.
Crude oil has also continued its decline from last week on the back of concern that COVID-19's delta strain will impact demand.
Crude hasn’t performed this poorly since October last year.
ASX momentum
As expected, the ASX carried its momentum from last week into its opening few hours.
S&P ASX 200 was up sitting at 7,553.20, gaining 14.80 points and up 0.20%, following its new record high 7538.4 to close out Friday’s trading. This is a new 100 day high.
The S&P/ASX 100 was up 0.11% to 6,244.4, the All Ordinaries is stable at 7,814.7, while the S&P/ASX Small Ordinaries fell 0.46% to 3,448.6 in morning trading.
We don’t hear too much about the Small Ordinaries Index, however, for those looking at small cap stocks, this index is an institutional benchmark for small-cap Australian equity portfolios. It measures companies included in the S&P/ASX 300, but not in the S&P/ASX 100.
The biggest gainers on the ASX this morning were Huon Aquaculture Group Ltd (ASX:HUO) up 38% to $3.85, Kaili Resources (ASX:KLR) up 31.8% to 2.9 cents and Charger Metals NL (ASX:CHR) up 27.9% per cent to 55 cents. Suncorp Group Ltd (ASX:SUN) was up 7.93% and Insurance Australia Group Limited (ASX:IAG) is up 4.31%.
Looking abroad
Hong Kong and China saw shares fluctuate, while South Korea remained stable and Japan is enjoying a day off following a big two weeks of Olympics.
Stocks
- The S&P 500 rose 0.17%
- Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 Index rose 0.3%
- Kospi index rose 2.59%
- Hang Seng Index rose 0.95%
- Shanghai Composite Index rose 0.59%
- FTSE 100 is up 0.035%