This was published 6 years ago
That's it for me for today.
Thanks for everyone who joined me for the ride today.
I've been involved in markets for two decades now and can safely say I've never seen anything like it, GFC included. It was remarkable.
Looking forward to doing it all again next week.
Hope you all have a great weekend.
Australian stocks staged a dramatic recovery in late trade on Friday, recovering earlier losses of more than 8 per cent to close up more than 4 per cent.
The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 finished the session with a mammoth gain of 234.7 points, or 4.4 per cent, at 5539.3.
Having tumbled to 4873.7 in early trade, hitting the lowest level since early 2016 and extending the losses from the record high hit less than a month ago to more than 30 per cent, the index staged a remarkable recovery into the close, gaining more than 10 per cent in the space of 90 minutes.
“It’s one of those days where everyone is looking for the smoking gun, but in reality we don't need one,” said Chris Weston, head of research at Pepperstone.
“This reeks of portfolio flow where a fund has stepped up and bravely put some money to work and the market is caught on.
In further bad news for retail landlords, Maquarie Equities says the list of administrations is getting longer.
In the calendar year to date, nine retail groups have entered voluntary administration and/or announced store closures. "
"We estimate a total space hand back to date of 108,700 square meters, or around 83 per cent of Westfield Bondi Junction", the broker says.
It's been a tough year for global equity markets, especially the past three weeks.
How tough, you say?
The tweet below provides some insight.
I'd like to give you some more information about the Botswana Stock Exchange but my Thomson Reuters Eikon terminal is sadly lacking anything substantial. Alas, I can give you some insight as to how regional Asian markets have fared in 2020.
For weeks, investors have been pleading for governments to shore up a global economy ravaged by the coronavirus. But after the biggest wave of stimulus announcements since the outbreak began, fear is mounting the efforts might not provide the salvation markets are looking for.
Emergency measures in the UK, Italy and Australia, along with a commitment from Germany's Angela Merkel to do "whatever is necessary," were met with fresh waves of selling in stocks, putting the MSCI All-Country World Index on the brink of a bear market. The gloom veered toward panic after President Donald Trump announced an underwhelming set of US support measures and restricted travel from Europe.
More disappointment was to follow, when the European Central Bank left rates unchanged in favour of a temporary expansion of bond purchases. The Stoxx Europe 600 tumbled the most on record while US equities plunged more than 9 per cent, extending losses after a 15-minute NYSE-mandated halt.
While government stimulus helped bring an end to the global recession triggered by the financial crisis, investors are increasingly sceptical whether policymakers can forestall a virus-induced downturn. Fiscal and monetary measures may only help with the knock-on effects of the epidemic's widespread shutdown of economic activity, leaving investors little option but to await the subsiding of the virus itself.
"The central bank 'put' has established a floor under risk assets for the past decade. This is the first time that markets are seriously questioning whether it will work again," Jason Daw, a strategist at Societe Generale SA in Singapore, wrote in a note on Thursday.
"While fiscal policy is better medicine than monetary, neither are properly equipped to mitigate the coronavirus-induced growth shock."
There's more here.
Myer chairman Garry Hounsell has snapped up a tranche of Myer shares, taking advantage of the plunging market to pick up the stock at an all-time low.
Mr Hounsell bought 400,000 shares in Myer yesterday for just under $100,000, marking a purchase price of around 24 cents. Myer shares are currently trading at 22 cents.
The purchase takes Mr Hounsell’s total shareholding in Myer up to 1.4 million shares. Chief executive John King also purchased 350,000 shares on Wednesday.
The duo are not the first executives to take advantage of the low share prices to bolster their holding, with retail magnate Gerry Harvey taking a similar approach last Friday and purchasing $1 million in Harvey Norman shares.
Adairs chairman Michael Butler also purchased 120,000 shares in his company this week at the cost of $200,000.
Afterpay and its buy now pay later rival Zip have attempted to quell growing market jitters that the coronavirus could trigger a wave of defaults from their younger shoppers and also impact on the extensive debt funding needed to support their consumer finance business models.
"We are well prepared to respond to any changes changes in customer repayment behaviour, however we have not seen any changes relative to past performance," said Afterpay in a statement to the ASX on Friday which was provided in response to "market enquiries".
An ASIC report in 2018 said around 44 per cent of buy now, pay later customers had an income of less than $40,000 a year and there were already indications of a real risk that such commitments could contribute to financial over-commitment by users.
Afterpay also reassured the market that the debt needed to fund the billions of dollars of transactions by its customers is also secure stating that funding its billion dollar warehouse facilities "are not subject to traditional debt facility covenants."
Afterpay shares are off 7.9 per cent at $22. Z1P is down a larger 10.1 per cent at $1.24.
Colin has more detail here.
Industrial property giant and the country's largest listed trust Goodman Group has raised €1 billion ($1.7 billion) through the sale of assets in central Europe in line with its strategy of focusing on major capital cities.
It will use the funds to increase its exposure in Germany, France, Spain, Benelux and Italy. Goodman sold the warehouses, based in Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic and Slovakia, to European-based logistics group GLP.
Goodman is one of the major landlords across the world for online giant Amazon. In Sydney, Amazon is based at the Goodman Centenary Distribution Centre in Moorebank.
Philippe Van der Beken, chief executive of Goodman Europe, which owned the properties in partnership with the Goodman Group, said there remains strong demand for industrial property. "We will continue to focus on owning high-quality properties and building out our significant development pipeline in these markets, where barriers to entry are high and land is scarce," he said.
GPT shares are down 8.1 per cent at $4.85.
Carolyn has more here.