ASX Small Cap Lunch Wrap: Bad-ass Aussie stocks defy Wall Street weakness

Local markets are defying Wall Street leads for a second time in ONE week, lifting themselves off the 12-month lows of Thursday to be trading in the green at lunchtime.

At 12.25pm, the ASX 200 was ahead by about 17 points or +0.25%  to around 6,830.

 

LUNCHTIME ON THE ASX200

Local investors continued to fret and fiddle over the stronger-than-expected Australian inflation data drop this week which has absolutely raised the odds of further central bank policy fingers tightening around the neck of our innocent national economy. And squeeeeeezing.

The unbullockish Reserve Bank of Australia governor M. Bullock said this week her board and their bank would’t hesitate to lift its 4.1% cash rate again if there were but the merest hint of a “material” upward revision to the inflation outlook. And goodness me there has been.

The benchmark index is still on track to give away more than 2% this week.
 

ASX PERFORMANCE

 

ASX SECTORS ON FRIDAY AT LUNCH

In company news, there’s been some notable gains at the top end of town.

Westpac (ASX:WBC) been making up for a midweek wobble – up 0.8% – leading a Financial Sector rally-of-sorts. All the Big 4 are fighting fit following Thursday’s capitulation –  CBA’s also found 0.8 per cent, NAB 0.7 per cent and ANZ about half that.

We’re kinda seeing some rebound strength in the bigger lithium plays too. Pilbara Minerals (ASX:PLS) (up 2.1%) and IGO (ASX:IGO) (up 1.3%), helping to offset declines in the iron ore majors.

 

NOT THE ASX

Well first up, this:

Cricket Australia (CA) today released its Annual Report for 2022-23

In the 2022-23 financial year, CA reported a net loss of $16.9 million driven by an expected low point in our revenue cycle with lower media rights and match revenues during a non-Ashes year.

That doesn’t make sense.

No wonder Greg Chappell’s broke and the CA chairman (ex-NSW Premier)  Mike Baird can’t scratch a dollar out of cricket.

Over in the States

A welcome pullback in longer term Treasury yields boosted sentiment, with the benchmark 10-year US yields falling toward 4.8% after hitting 5% earlier this week.

In regular Thursday business, the Dow fell -0.75%, the S&P 500 crashed -1.2% and the tech-heavy Nasdaq collapsed -1.75%,.

The Nasdaq is now smack-bang in correction territory.

Of the 11 S&P sectors, eight ended lower – Communication Services, IT and Consumer Discretionary the real laggards.

Corporate earnings reports disappointed most and stronger-than-expected US GDP data largely offset the pullback in yields.

But… right now, I’m seeing some US Futures in the green pointing to a positive Friday, perhaps now that the market’s had its tanty and sold off for the last two straight sessions.

US traders have continued to show mixed emotions around Wall Street’s mixed bag of earnings results and now it’s latest strong economic data.

Dow futures rose 0.3%, S&P 500 futures gained 0.5% and Nasdaq 100 futures climbed 0.8% around lunchtime in Sydney.

In company news, the stock price for Amazon (AMZN) powered over 5.6% following the beating it gave market estimates for both top and bottom lines.

The carmaker Ford shed 4.1% on lower earnings and a weak effort at positive guidance – with the US autoworkers’ strike a major worry.

 

ASX SMALL CAP WINNERS

Here are the best performing ASX small cap stocks for 25 October [intraday]:

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Industrial Minerals (ASX:IND) has agreed to ‘binding terms’ with North West Quarries for the exclusive option to acquire an 80% interest in the non-construction material mineral rights – which also include lithium and HPQ – at the Pippinagarra Quarry Project near badly misspelled Port Hedland.

“The project is located within world class Pilbara lithium province of Western Australia and near some of the world’s largest hard rock lithium mines. IND hold a number of tenements in the region that are prospective for HPQ and lithium, making the addition of this Project a logical expansion of IND’s activities in the Pilbara region,” the company told the ASX this morning.

IND has also recently applied for further tenure ‘proximal’ to the Pippingarra Project.

REE and gold explorer Terrain Minerals (ASX:TMX) is also ahead after announcing it had raised more than $430k in a non-renounceable entitlement offer. The company says 15.85% of shareholders (187) participated in the offer with a recorded unallocated shortfall of ~$355k.

TMX in September raised ~$785k through a placement to sophisticated and professional investors.

Webcentral Group (ASX:WCG) entered into binding agreements with an investment group based in Europe consisting of Oakley Capital (Oakley) and its partners to sell two-thirds of its Webcentral and Melbourne IT domain name registry, consumer hosting (cPanel hosting) and email hosting services business for total value of $165m.

Webcentral’s MD Joe Demase says the sale is a big win on several fronts.

“Oakley and their partners combine a deep understanding of the domains and hosting sector with a proven value creation playbook.

“In partnership with Tom and Jochen, the Oakley team is uniquely positioned to support the next stage of Webcentral’s growth, enabling us to expand our capabilities, further improve our services to clients, and pursue new growth opportunities internationally.”

WCG’s big deal bullies: 

• Total Transaction Value of $165M
• Net cash proceeds of $115M
• Net cash position of $84M after debt repayment and transaction costs
• Retained one-third equity interestin Domains Business
• Agreement to buy $12M of cloud services and managed support services from Webcentral over 5 years, with a minimum of $4M in the first year
• Completion expected by late-November 2023

 

ASX SMALL CAP LOSERS

Here are the most-worst performing ASX small cap stocks for 25 October [intraday]:

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