IG Markets Morning Prices

Good morning,

In overnight trade in the US, the major indices finished largely unchanged, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average climbing back above the 11,000 point level after falling early in very thin Columbus Day trade and ahead of a busy week of Q3 earnings.

For the session, the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ all finished unchanged.

In Australian, the ASX 200 is called to open the session 0.1% weaker at 4695, just shy of the 4700 level.

In terms of local trade, leads from the US were uninspiring to say the least. We could see a little bit of weakness among industrial and material names after the respective sectors in the US fell 0.3% and 0.2%, to be the biggest movers on the session.

Base metal leads are unlikely to help either after they were all down between 0.1% and 1.2%, with aluminium performing the worst. Also, Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton were down 1.1% and 0.5% in US trade, with BHP Billiton's ADR calling the locally listed stock 0.7% weaker on the open. A flat overnight session for gold futures will likely have little impact on gold miners.

We could see some weakness among energy names after Crude Oil snapped a three-day winning streak, declining 1.7% to US$82 per barrel overnight.

With the US bond market shut for the Columbus Day holiday overnight, currencies across the board were relatively subdued. With the fixed-income market being a key driver for the US dollar and no major releases of note, participants found little reason to trade. Having said that, the US dollar did manage to regain some lost ground against all G-10 currencies, including the AUD as traders looked to cover-back some of their short positions.

Looking ahead to today's forex action and we're likely to see relatively tight range-bound trade. The major catalysts are likely to be the NAB Business Confidence survey at 11.30 as well as how Asian markets trade, especially the Shanghai Composite which could be due for some profit taking.