Australian shares are set open lower. Shares on Wall Street failed to hold early gains despite tech stocks rebounding. Yields on Treasuries retreated from a seven-year peak with global growth looking unsure and trade tensions still causing a stir. The US dollar drifted lower and crude oil hovered around $75 a barrel. The IMF downgraded its forecast for global growth for this year to 3.7 per cent from 3.9 per cent.
Local economic newsFrom the Australian Bureau of Statistics we see building and construction activity for June due out later today.
Westpac -MI release consumer confidence.
MarketsWall Street closed mixed yesterday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.2 per cent to close at 26,431, the S&P 500 lost 0.1 per cent to 2,880 and the NASDAQ ended 0.03 per cent higher to close at 7738.
European markets closed higher yesterday: London’s FTSE added 0.1 per cent, Paris increased 0.4 per cent and Frankfurt gained 0.3 per cent.
Asian markets closed mixed, Tokyo’s Nikkei lost 1.3 per cent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 0.1 per cent and China’s Shanghai Composite added 0.2 per cent.
On the futures markets, the ASX futures are pointing to a 6 points fall. Yesterday, the Australian share market closed lower with the S&P/ASX 200 Index closing 59 points lower to 6041.
Company newsThe Star Entertainment Group
(ASX:SGR) is pleased to announce that in accordance to the Company’s Long Term Performance Plan, over 918,thousand performance rights - representing 99.65 per cent of the performance rights previously granted to various executives for the financial year ended 30 June 2015 have vested due to the achievement of the performance hurdles on testing. The performance rights that have vested include over 350,thousand performance rights granted to the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer. Performance hurdles satisfied The FY15 Grant comprised a 50 per cent earnings per share (EPS) performance hurdle and a 50 per cent relative total shareholder return (TSR) performance hurdle. The EPS hurdle measures the growth in statutory earnings per ordinary share adjusted for the theoretical win rate in the VIP Rebate business. The target hurdle of 25.1 cents was set by the Board by reference to the Company’s Board approved five-year business plan. For FY18, the EPS performance was 26.2 cents and was above the target approved by the Board. Shares in Star Entertainment Group
(ASX:SGR) closed 0.6 per cent lower to $4.97 yesterday.
Ex-DividendsSequoia Financial Group
(ASX:SEQ) is paying 0.5 cents fully franked
CurrenciesOne Australian Dollar at 7:40AM was buying US71.04 cents, 54.05 Pence Sterling, 80.25 Yen and 61.82 Euro cents.
Commodities Iron ore futures are pointing to 1.2 per cent gain
Gold gained $4.90 to $US1194 an ounce.
Silver was up 10 cents at $US14.43 an ounce.
Oil added 53 cents to $US74.70 a barrel.
CryptocurrenciesThe three most traded cryptocurrencies are trading lower: Bitcoin has lost 0.5 per cent to US$6632, Ethereum has fallen 1.2 per cent to US$227 and EOS has dropped 1.1 per cent to US5.89 cents.
