Australian Stock Market Report – Afternoon 4-15-13

AFTERNOON REPORT
(5pm AEST)

The price of gold continued to slide over the weekend as fund managers exited their positions on speculation it has run too hard, too fast. Influential American investor George Soros didn't help matters, telling the South China Morning Post that gold is no longer a safe haven for investors. Gold futures are holding at US$1501.40 an ounce, and have fallen by over 5 per cent over the course of the week.

Not surprisingly, gold stocks bore the brunt of the selling. Australia's largest listed gold producer Newcrest Mining (NCM) saw its share price drop by 8.2 per cent to $17.92 while AngloGold Ashanti (AGG) was down 7.8 per cent to $3.80 and Alacer Gold Corp (AQG) was lower by 11.8 per cent to $3.07. OceanaGold Corp (OGC) was weaker by 9.4 per cent to $2.13.

Adding to the negative sentiment was weaker than expected Chinese economic growth (GDP) figures. Official Chinese data showed annual growth slowed to 7.7 per cent in March.

Index leader BHP Billiton (BHP) and rival Rio Tinto (RIO) shed around 3 per cent each today. Both companies were impacted by a fall in commodity prices but also some trepidation ahead of the release of their quarterly production updates. RIO's is released tomorrow while BHP will update the market on Wednesday.

Banking stocks fared better, with the sector up 0.2 per cent.

On the market overall, a total of 1.5 billion shares were traded, worth $4.4 billion. 249 were up, 735 were down and 333 were unchanged.

At 5pm AEDT the Australian dollar was buying US104.38c, £0.6813 and €79.85c.

Ahead tonight, the Empire State survey, capital flows data and the NAHB survey are released.

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