Christmas has come early for the bank’s shareholders with the decision to slightly increase the 2024 dividend – despite a single-digit decline in the net profit and cash earnings.
Beating the market benchmark is never easy, with 72 per cent of Australian actively managed global equity general funds trailing the S&P World Index in the six months to June 30, 2024. Domestic equity funds performed slightly better, albeit against a significantly lower bar set by the S&P/ASX 200 Index.
Market weakens on US recession risk, Tabcorp acquisition, gold stocks hit
The local market opened the week on a negative note, with the threat of US recession sending every sector lower.
The rate sensitive sectors were the hardest hit, with utilities falling 3.2 per cent and technology 2.6 per cent behind the likes of Zip Co (ASX:ZIP) which fell 7.4 per cent.
Among the biggest losers were the gold miners, with both St Barbara (ASX:SBM) and Silverlake (ASX:SLR) down more than 7.1 per cent despite a further weakening in the AUD.
Investors are clearly becoming concerned about the threat of positive real interest rates on the price of the commodity.
The consumer staples sector outperformed once again, with the perceived defensiveness seeing a loss of just 0.3 per cent.
Shares in Tabcorp (ASX:TAH) were a rare gainer, one of just 12 companies finishing to the better, adding 1.6 per cent on news they are taking an equity stake in digital wagering platform Dabble, which employs gambling influencers.
Dubber sinks, Tyro upgrades, Link opens the books
Shares in popular recording and machine learning group Dubber (ASX:DUB) lost a quarter of their value, with the company restating revenues and announcing the departure of their Chief Financial Officer upon exiting a trading halt.
The news saw revenue cut from $35 to just $25 million following a ‘review of customer payment history and timing of recognition of invoices’ which is rarely a good sign.
Shares in Tyro Payments (ASX:TYR) on the other hand gained 1.7 per cent after the company finally increased its FY23 earnings guidance following a challenging beginning to 2022.
The group announced $5 million in savings from its cost cutting program, reducing operating leverage and ultimately increased earnings expectations by close to 20 per cent.
Shares in Pushpay (ASX:PPH) gained 4.9 per cent, after private equity group BGH Capital increased their offer for the group to $1.2 billion.
Link (ASX:LNK) barely budged after receiving positive news that management were opening the books to Canadian suitor Dye & Durham in their second tilt for the corporate markets business.
Nasdaq hits two year low, Dimon calls for 20 per cent fall, markets weaker
All three US benchmarks finished weaker ahead of another quarterly earnings season next week, with the Nasdaq reaching a two-year low, falling 1 per cent.
There was little data for the market to process, so comments from JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon set a negative tone when he suggested the market could fall another 20 per cent from current levels due to aggressive central bank policy.
The combination of soft data followed by a strong jobs report has many thinking the Federal Reserve will be forced to ‘break’ the market in order to get inflation under control.
The Dow Jones fell 0.3 and the S&P500 0.8 per cent, with the strength of the US dollar a continuing concern for the global economy.
Shares in electric vehicle maker Rivian (NYSE:RIVN), which is part owned by Amazon (NYSE:AMZN) fell another 7 per cent after the company indicated it would need to recall as many as 13,000 vehicles due to a possible safety issue.
Tesla (NYSE:TSLA) reported record monthly sales of Chinese-made vehicles, which totalled more than 83,000, an 8 per cent increase on August; shares finished flat.
