Australian Indexes at 2-Month High

Marcus Jacob
22 Jul, 2013
New York City

Australian indexes closed at a 2-month high on the back of a rally in resource stocks. Precious metal prices gained and Australian dollar edged slightly higher. Origin Energy agreed to acquire 50% participating interest in a drilling project owned by MEO Australia.

[R]5:00 PM Sydney – Australian indexes closed at a 2-month high on the back of a rally in resource stocks. Precious metal prices gained and Australian dollar edged slightly higher. Origin Energy agreed to acquire 50% participating interest in a drilling project owned by MEO Australia.[/R]

Australian market indexes closed at a 2-month high on the back of a rebound in precious metal prices and advance in industrials and banks.

The ASX 200 index gained 29.80 or 0.6% to close at 5,001.90 and the broader All Ordinaries rose 29.50 to 4,988.90.

Australian dollar traded edged up to 92.23 U.S. cents and in stock trading turnover declined to 590 million shares worth $3.3 billion.

Stocks in Review

Rio Tinto added 32 cents to $56.55 and BHP up 26 cents to $34.12. Woodside Petroleum Limited gained 50 cents to $38.23.

David Jones Limited soared 11 cents or 4.5% to $2.57 and Breville Group rose 4 cents to $7.67. Woolworths increased 21 cents to $33.51.

Mirvac Group slid 1 cent to $1.62. Lend Lease gained 14 cents to $8.79.

Westpac added 14 cents to $29.40 and Commonwealth jumped 0.6% to $71.88. National Australia Bank up to $30.41 and ANZ increased 9 cents to $28.91.

BC Iron Limited slid 0.3% to $3.56 after the iron ore miner lifted its fourth quarter production and shipment target to record 1.6 million wet metric tons and shipped 5 million wet metric tons of iron ore during the fiscal 2013.

The company expects in fiscal 2014 to ship between 5.8 million to 6.2 million tons of ore.

Billabong International Limited soared 5% to 42 cents after the request from Oaktree Capital and Centerbridge Partners was declined by Australia''s takeover regulator to delay a $359 million refinancing deal.

Macquarie Atlas Roads Group surged 8.7% to $2.26 after the toll roads operators estimated toll revenue jump 4.2% in the June quarter after the company had revised toll schedules and on increased traffic.

For the six months to June, average toll revenue climbed 3.9% and traffic grew 1.7% from the same period of last year.

Toll revenues for the quarter jumped 2.4% to €499.1 million.

Origin Energy Limited increased 1.3% to $12.84 after the oil and gas explorer plan to acquire 50% of partnership in MEO Australia Limited and Origin will pay 80% of the costs incurred so far and 80% for additional exploration.