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Australian shares are back at their highest since the COVID market plunge nearly 14 months ago, after technology, property, and energy firms powered a fourth straight session of gains.
The benchmark ASX 200 finished Wednesday’s trade 0.6 per cent higher at 6928.0, its highest close since February 24 last year when stocks were in the early stages of pandemic freefall.
It’s just the second time the market has finished above 6900 points since the coronavirus wiped 39 per cent from the bourse in the steepest bear market in history.
Wednesday’s session eclipsed the previous post-COVID peak set in February with the help of improved commodity prices and further gains for the travel sector.
The Australian sharemarket rose for a fourth straight session for the first time this year to hit its best close in more than 13 months.
The ASX 200 finished 0.6 per cent higher at 6928.0. It’s just the second time the benchmark index has closed above 6900 since February 24, 2020.
Energy, property, and tech shares were strong, while Rio Tinto and Commonwealth Bank also rose.
US futures were slightly ahead, pointing to modest early gains on Wall Street tonight.
Opinion
Canva is an Australian company worth about $19.7 billion but one that most investors have never heard of.
It smashes growth records with monotonous regularity and its three 30-something co-founders are now worth an estimated $8 billion.
But the freshly minted young rich listers don’t appear to be interested in the billionaire status. As one of the trio, Cliff Obrecht said on Wednesday, “it’s not our vibe to hoard money”.
They have built Canva on the back of producing digital graphic design tools for everything from marketing presentations to greeting cards, that are sufficiently simple to appeal to a broad base of users.
The Federal Court has slapped the Commonwealth Bank with a $7 million fine for overcharging business overdraft customers.
In a case launched by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), CBA was accused of false and misleading conduct for charging much higher rates than promised on 12,119 occasions.
ASIC said CBA had admitted that because of a systems error, it charged more than 1,510 customers an interest rates of about 34 per cent (in most cases), instead of about 16 per cent.
Justice Michael Lee elected to impose a $7 million fine, the amount submitted by ASIC, determining the misleading representations from CBA were significant and it had been slow to fix the error.
ASIC Commissioner Sean Hughes said: “CBA’s delay in remediating customers following this error was an aggravating factor in the Court’s determination of the penalty. When financial institutions discover overcharging, they must take immediate action to remediate impacted consumers.”
Shares in CBA were last 0.6 per cent higher at $86.50. The nation’s largest lender has added nearly 5 per cent to its value in 2021, narrowly outpacing the wider ASX 200.
ASX 200 tech stocks are on the march for a fourth straight session, with Afterpay and EML Payments leading the charge.
The tech sector has added a collective 9.7 per cent in value - or $9.8 billion - since the close of trade on Tuesday last week.
If the sector finishes in front today, it will be the first time since mid-January it has gained for four straight days.
Yesterday’s collective 5.1 per cent gain was the best day for ASX 200 tech stocks since July 21 last year, and was driven by a 10 per cent leap for Afterpay.
Shares in $620 million biotech Imugene today hit their highest since January 2008 after promising news on its checkpoint immunotherapy candidate, PD1-Vaxx.
The firm’s stock rose by as much as 15 per cent to 15 cents, and was last 11.5 per cent ahead at 13.5 cents after it confirmed the Phase I clinical trial of PD1-Vaxx will proceed to the third and final highest dose cohort.
Shares in the firm were last this high in January 2008.
“I am excited to hear the Cohort Review Committee recommended opening the third and final dose cohort based on the outstanding safety and tolerability of PD1-Vaxx reviewed to date,” principal investigator Professor Gary Richardson said.
About 21.4 million Imugen shares have changed hands today so far - more than triple the daily average of the past fortnight.
In other news, Imugene announced that the prestigious Mayo Clinic in Phoenix Arizona has received Institutional Review Board approval to commence and join the Phase I clinical trial of PD1-Vaxx in USA.
Real Asset Management is boosting its development pipeline with pandemic-proof essential services and neighbourhood retail assets as its considers a possible $800 million float later in the year.
Income-generating, high-yield assets with long leases form the basis of its $650 million of real estate under management across 20 properties weighted to the eastern seaboard.
Founded five years ago by chief executive and former UBS operatives Scott Kelly and head of real estate Will Gray, RAM will use its $125 million development pipeline to add value to existing properties and buy new assets.
“We are examining a potential float of about $800 million into a new real estate investment trust focusing on essential services later in the year, but no firm decision has been made,” Mr Kelly said.
Opinion
China is rushing towards the development and distribution of a central bank digital currency while the rest of the developed world dithers along at a leisurely and cautious pace.
From comments made by the head of the People’s Bank of China research bureau, Wang Xin, at a briefing late last week it would appear the pace of China’s experimentation with a digital currency, via the Digital Currency Electronic Payment (DC/EP), is accelerating.
It has already distributed – given away – about 200 million yuan ($40 million) in pilot projects in its major cities.
More than 100 overseas travellers will arrive in Melbourne on Thursday as Victoria’s quarantine system is restarted after a new strain of COVID-19 leaked from hotel quarantine and forced the government to halt overseas arrivals in mid-February.
Victoria recorded no new local cases of coronavirus for the 40th day in a row on Wednesday as the federal government examined reopening travel to several Asian and Pacific destinations without the need for lengthy stints in quarantine.
There were 11,746 test results returned on Monday. Just one active case remains in Victoria – an international flight crew member who tested positive to COVID-19 on March 29.
Health authorities say that a total of 117,700 doses of COVID-19 vaccine have been administered by state health authorities in Victoria, with 1023 shots delivered on Monday. Authorities said 98,584 of the jabs are first doses and 19,116 are second doses.