MARKET NEWS
* The Dow industrials closed at the highest level in nearly
five years on Tuesday in a lightly traded session before key
decisions in Germany and the United States that could give
markets a further boost.
* The dollar index wallowed near a four-month low hit
in the previous session, after rating agency Moody's threatened
to downgrade the U.S. government debt.
DATA/EVENTS (GMT)
0530 India Industrial output July
0800 Italy Industrial output July
0800 Germany Constitutional court announces decision on
the legality of the euro zone's new permanent
bailout fund and budget rules
0900 EZ Industrial production July
1230 US Import/export prices August
US Federal Open Market Committee begins two-day
meeting on monetary policy
PRICES
Precious metals prices 0028 GMT
Metal Last Change Pct chg YTD pct chg Volume
Spot Gold 1733.36 1.72 +0.10 10.84
Spot Silver 33.53 0.04 +0.12 21.09
Spot Platinum 1604.08 4.68 +0.29 15.15
Spot Palladium 665.20 -0.30 -0.05 1.95
COMEX GOLD DEC2 1735.90 1.00 +0.06 10.79 1771
COMEX SILVER DEC2 33.58 0.01 +0.04 20.29 415
Euro/Dollar 1.2851
Dollar/Yen 77.83
COMEX gold and silver contracts show the most active months
(Reporting by Rujun Shen; Editing by Ed Davies)
Wednesday, September 12, 2012
Tuesday, September 4, 2012
Fortescue shares hit three-year low
Fortescue shares had fallen 32 cents, or 9.4 per cent, to $3.09 by 1250 AEST.
A volume of nearly 41 million Fortescue shares have changed hands - the highest on the Australian Securities Exchange.
Iron ore miners, including Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton and smaller caps Atlas Iron and BC Iron all posted share price falls of between two and four per cent on Wednesday.
Even some good news for its balance sheet could not help the share price, after Fortescue said it would pocket $US300 million ($A294.59 million) from the sale of a power station at its Solomon mine in the Pilbara region of Western Australia to a Canadian company.
Fortescue's woes are related to iron ore spot prices that had dropped to about $US87 ($A85.43) a tonne on Wednesday, less than half the record levels of about $US180 ($A176.76) a tonne in the first half of calendar 2011.
Iron ore is Australia's biggest export earner.
Fortescue announced plans on Tuesday to shelve $US1.6 billion ($A1.57 billion) of expansion plans and cut hundreds of workers' jobs.
Less than a fortnight ago, Fortescue chief executive Nev Power said the miner would press on with its $US9 billion ($A8.84 billion) largely debt-funded expansion of output to 155 million tonnes a year by next June.
Now it is only planning to expand to 115 million tonnes a year.
Analysts from investment bank UBS forecast a return to $US120 a tonne for the spot iron ore price by the end of the year.
Monday, September 3, 2012
PSU banks go slow on loan rate cuts
NEW DELHI: Over two weeks after the government suggested that state-owned lenders could lower the EMI (equated monthly installment) burden on consumer durables finance and auto loans, only a handful of players have moved ahead.
On Monday, Punjab National Bank and Allahabad Bank pared rates and joined their Mumbai-based peers Union Bank of India and Central Bank on making auto loans more attractive. PNB, the second-largest state-owned lender, cut home loan rates by 25 basis points and auto loan rates by up to 50 basis points (100 basis points equal a percentage point).
The proposal to reduce rates, to prop up demand, may have been the driving force behind PNB's across-the-board cut, but Central Bank and Union Bank also have a "limited period" element in their offers, aimed at propping up sales during the festival season.
At least two bank chiefs, however, said that they were finding it tough to reduce rates on auto loans as they were close to the base rate. A further reduction would impact their base rate and the overall portfolio, resulting in an impact on their profits.
A third bank chairman said that a reduction by the public sector players was unlikely to boost sales given the fact that they were fringe players despite, the state-owned lenders accounting for over 70% of the overall loan and deposits in the country. But when it comes to auto loans, three players-the State Bank group, HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank-control over 70% of the market.
"It is for them to cut rates. We can only boost sentiments," the banker said. Bankers pointed out that consumer durables were hardly purchased using bank finance and most of the business had now shifted to credit cards or to non-banking finance companies, some of whom were offering "zero per cent" finance.
Last month, finance minister P Chidambaram had told public sector bank chiefs that a reduction in EMIs for consumer durables and automobiles will increase demand and boost manufacturing, which had been sluggish in recent months. A combination of high interest rates and higher prices has prompted several buyers to defer purchase of cars, especially run on petrol, high-end TV sets and refrigerators.
On Monday, Punjab National Bank and Allahabad Bank pared rates and joined their Mumbai-based peers Union Bank of India and Central Bank on making auto loans more attractive. PNB, the second-largest state-owned lender, cut home loan rates by 25 basis points and auto loan rates by up to 50 basis points (100 basis points equal a percentage point).
The proposal to reduce rates, to prop up demand, may have been the driving force behind PNB's across-the-board cut, but Central Bank and Union Bank also have a "limited period" element in their offers, aimed at propping up sales during the festival season.
At least two bank chiefs, however, said that they were finding it tough to reduce rates on auto loans as they were close to the base rate. A further reduction would impact their base rate and the overall portfolio, resulting in an impact on their profits.
A third bank chairman said that a reduction by the public sector players was unlikely to boost sales given the fact that they were fringe players despite, the state-owned lenders accounting for over 70% of the overall loan and deposits in the country. But when it comes to auto loans, three players-the State Bank group, HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank-control over 70% of the market.
"It is for them to cut rates. We can only boost sentiments," the banker said. Bankers pointed out that consumer durables were hardly purchased using bank finance and most of the business had now shifted to credit cards or to non-banking finance companies, some of whom were offering "zero per cent" finance.
Last month, finance minister P Chidambaram had told public sector bank chiefs that a reduction in EMIs for consumer durables and automobiles will increase demand and boost manufacturing, which had been sluggish in recent months. A combination of high interest rates and higher prices has prompted several buyers to defer purchase of cars, especially run on petrol, high-end TV sets and refrigerators.
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