Australian Indexes Halt 7-day Advance

Marcus Jacob
25 Jul, 2014
New York City

Australian market indexes halted seven day advance and closed up 0.9% for the week. Flight Centre Travel Group lowered fiscal outlook and wrote down assets in India and in the U.S. Drillsearch quarterly revenues declined 4% but the annual sales soared three-fold.

[R]5:00 PM Sydney, Australia – Australian market indexes halted seven day advance and closed up 0.9% for the week. Flight Centre Travel Group lowered fiscal outlook and wrote down assets in India and in the U.S. Drillsearch quarterly revenues declined 4% but the annual sales soared three-fold.[/R]

Australian stocks declined for the first time after advancing for seven days in a row and market indexes gained nearly 1% in the week.

Australian dollar closed at 94.16 U.S. cents and stock trading turnover jumped to 660 million shares worth $5.74 billion.

ASX 200 index inched lower 4.30 to 5,583.50 and the broader All Ordinaries slid 2.60 to 5,574.20. For the week, ASX 200 increased 0.9%.

In the week ahead, investors are looking forward to more corporate earnings and the U.S. Federal Reserve is scheduled to trim bond buying by additional $10 billion to $25 billion.

Stocks in Review

Drillsearch Energy Limited gained 0.6% to $1.56 after the oil and gas explorer said total revenue in the year ending in June surged more than three-fold to $387 million from $102.2 million a year ago.

The company said revenue in the quarter declined 4% to $91.5 million from previous quarter.

Production in the quarter jumped 4% to 824,262 million barrels of oil equivalent from a year earlier.

Flight Centre Travel Group Ltd slipped 1.1% to $46.80 after the wholesale and corporate travel manager forecasted 7% declined in pre-tax profit on the write-down assets in the U.S. and India and a fine of $11 million.

The company expected sales and profit to grow in the current financial year.

GUD Holdings Limited declined 8.1% to $6.60 after the cleaning products and household appliances maker reported revenue in the year ending in June fell 0.8% to $591.6 million from $596.5 million a year ago.

Net profit in the year plunged 43.8% to $17.7 million compared to $31.5 million and diluted earnings per share dropped to 24.6 cents from 44 cents a year earlier.