Australian Stock Market Report – Afternoon 3-11-13

AFTERNOON REPORT
(5pm AEDT)

Despite a flat start, the Australian share market has closed higher thanks to strong gains from financial stocks and another rise on the Japanese sharemarket.

The All Ordinaries Index added 22.5pts today to close at 5160pts, its highest level since September 2008.

There were public holidays today in the ACT, Victoria and South Australia.

Mixed data out of China over the weekend saw some weakness in the materials sector, with index leader BHP Billiton (BHP) falling 27c to $35.82 and Rio Tinto (RIO) off $1.26 to $63.10.

However financial stocks fared much better. Shares in the Commonwealth Bank (CBA) closed above $70 a share for the first time, adding 30c today to $70.13.

Elsewhere, building products supplier CSR Limited (CSR) saw its share price rise by almost 3% to $2.16 as the company announced a restructure which includes 150 job cuts. CSR also announced it is expecting a big drop in profits as it battles a weak construction sector and the high Australian dollar. The affected staff are from CSR's glass making plant Viridian. One plant will be shut in July while two other processing units are likely to merge by July next year. CSR is trying to find as many jobs as possible to redeploy affected staff.

In economic data today, based on bookings for the period March 11-17, the Sydney-Melbourne air route remains the third busiest is the world. Data from the Centre for Aviation indicates that 196,596 seats are booked on the Sydney-Melbourne route for the period March 11-17. The busiest air routes are both in Japan: Tokyo-Sapporo at 260,912 seats, followed by Fukuoka-Tokyo with 205,586 seats.

The Australian dollar ended the day's trade at US102.24c, €78.6c and £0.6848c.

On the market overall, a total of 1.65 billion shares changed hands, worth $3.8 billion. 511 were up, 440 were down and 366 were unchanged.

Ahead tonight, the employment trends report is released in the US.

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