The market is down 33 points. ASX 200 Futures down 38 this morning.

The Dow Jones finished up 24. It was up 123 at best and down 33 at worst.

The S&P 500 closed up 7 to 1640.

Our Futures suggest a fall because as we went to bed last night the US Dow Futures were up 174, so Wall St has disappointed leaving the 64 point rise in our market in two days looking a bit vulnerable.

Syria — The market fell 80 points in a few minutes mid-session on a comment from Obama that having met with Congressional leaders he had decided that “America should take action” in Syria.

The oil price up 0.83%.

Gold price rebounds — up $15.80 to $1444.90.

Bonds fell — the 10 year bond yield up 7 basis points to 2.851%. It hit 2.911%.

The ISM index and construction spending came in ahead of expectations.

BHP was up 3.59% in the US overnight. The stock closed in the US up 37c on the close here yesterday. RIO up 5.54% in the US. That may look like a lot but it is a catch up on the Australian price over the last couple of days.

The A$ has rallied to 90.57c despite the 5th rise in the US$ index on the trot. The A$ is down from a recent high of $92.34c and a low of 88.48c on 5th August.

European markets mostly down. Spain and Greece up.

The Japanese market was up 2.99% yesterday. The Chinese market was up 1.18% yesterday.

The iron ore price was unchanged at $138.70 overnight.

Metals mixed — No major changes.

US Economics tonight — MBA Mortgage index, trade balance, auto/truck sales, Federal Beige Book.  Two Federal Governors speak.

In Europe tonight — eurozone retail sales, UK, Italian and Spanish Services PMI.

 RESULTS & STORIES

  •  There has been a magnitude 6.4 earthquake in Japan. No risk of a tsunami.
  • McMillan Shakespeare (MMS) — Up 4.87% — Tony Abbott has released an open letter to the car industry sharing his view on the topic of FBT. In the letter he says that the Coalition wants to return confidence to the car industry. It also says that they will not proceed with the Labor Government’s poorly thought through changes to the FBT arrangement on cars. A very reassuring letter — saying basically that if Coalition is elected, Labor’s FBT changes will become null and void.
  • Monadelphous (MND) — Wins a $235 million contract.
  • Main stocks ex-dividend today — CTX (17c), TWE (7c), AGI (5c)
  • Virgin Australia (VAH 42c) — Etihad purchased a line of 5.7 million shares at 39.5¢ yesterday, done through Patersons Securities. Etihad has increased their stake to 12.35% from 10.55%. It has FIRB permission to go to 19.9%.
  • The Trust Company’s (TRU 654c) board was in discussion last night after IOOF (IFL) launched a takeover offer yesterday. IOOF lodged a cash or scrip bid. There are now three bidders looking to take over the company. Should TRU go ahead with the IFL offer, Perpetual (PPT) will have three days to match the offer. Also watching closely are Equity Trustees (EQT) but they might not be able to match the cash offer both Perpetual and IOOF are prepared to throw.
  • Mining Services stocks came alight yesterday — ASL up 14.9%, TSE up 8.37%, NWH up 6.08%,
    EHL up 5.41%, FWD up 4.82%. — Certain stocks in the mining services sector have come out of reporting season completely unscathed and have had a stellar run since the start of July. A few of these stocks include: NRW Holdings (NWH) up 78% since July, Ausdrill (ASL) +128%, Forge (FGE) +44%, Downer EDI (DOW) +27%, Monadelphous Group (MND) +25%, Transfield Services (TSE) +89% and Bradken (BKN) +47%.
  • Election odds on Sportsbet: