You are currently browsing the Online Stockmarket Trading Update blog archives for February, 2010.
The US markets closed slightly higher. The Dow closed up 4 points or 0.1% at 10,325, the S&P500 was up 2 points or 0.1% at 1104 and the Nasdaq was up 4 points or 0.2% at 2238.
Following the news release made by the Admiralty Resources NL (ADY) on 21 September 2009, the Board of Directors of Admiralty advise that SCM Vallenar Iron Company has successfully signed a contract with a well known Chilean company for the sale of the plant and equipment located at the old Japonesa mine site for a total amount of US$1,666,000 (including VAT).
This equipment is not considered viable for use in larger scale mining operations and is therefore surplus to requirements. The contract was signed by both parties on 25th February 2010 and the terms of the contract stipulate that the purchaser will make an initial down payment of US$714,000 (including VAT) 15 days after the date of the contract, that is on 10th March 2010, and the balance payment for US$952,000 (including VAT) is scheduled 30 days after the date of the contract, that is 25th March 2010.
The funds to be received will improve VIC’s cash flow and fund the day-to-day operating expenses. VIC and the Board of Admiralty expect to be able in to be in a position to provide a further update in relation to the sale of the waste and low grade reject stockpiles prior to the end of the current quarter.
Coal Seam Gas explorer Westralian Gas and Power Ltd (WGP) announces that AWE Limited (AWE) will farm-in for a 90% equity share in Exploration Permit EP 455 in the North Perth Basin. AWE will pay $200,000 to WGP for the equity share and carry WGP through a gross permit expenditure of up to $7,500,000 after which AWE will pay 90 per cent and WGP 10 per cent of approved work programs and budget expenditure.
AWE announced in its December 2009 Quarterly Report that the March quarter will see first field work in AWE’s objective to evaluate the gas potential of shales in its onshore Perth Basin permits. In March AWE will drill Woodada Deep- 1 within its 100% owned production permit, L5 located adjacent to EP455. It will recover core samples which will be sent for detailed analysis to assist in determining the gas production potential of these shales. AWE had undertaken analysis of drill cuttings from a number of wells and the data to date has been sufficiently positive to encourage the commitment to a full coring program.
www.westraliangasandpower.com.au
Auckland Airport (AIA) today continued its recent move into the accommodation sector with the announcement it intends to develop and own a 125 room Formule 1 Hotel. The Formule 1 Hotel, to be operated by Accor Hospitality, will be completed in time for the Rugby World Cup 2011. Accor, one of the leading global hotel operators, will also be operating the Novotel Auckland Airport, and the Formule 1 brand offers the most affordable accommodation offering from the extensive Accor range of hotels.
Auckland Airport general manager Peter Alexander said, “We are extremely pleased to be able to announce this new development. This new Formule 1 hotel will offer budget conscious travellers simple and functional comfort at Auckland Airport. And it will beautifully complement our 4-star plus Novotel Auckland Airport, which is already well underway to also be ready in time for the world cup.” Renowned architectural firm Jasmax has been selected to design the Formule 1, and development will be project managed by RCP. Mr Alexander added, “This 2-star budget Formule 1 Hotel will be a fantastic addition to Auckland Airport. With a Formule 1 and a Novotel in our Auckland Airport accommodation portfolio, both run by a world-class operator in Accor, we will soon be able to meet two very different market segment needs, and we are determined to ensure that in time we can serve all other travellers’ short-stay accommodation requirements. If the demand is there we intend to meet it, right here in the airport grounds.”
Interesting times are ahead of us with the Federal Government encouraging new entrants to break the monopoly that the ASX has in the Australian Equity Markets and allow further rival Stock Markets into Australia.
The ASX can see the writing on the wall with their own announcement on the upcoming upgrade to their technology.
Historically, the ASX used a technology called SEATS that our systems would connect to for market data. A number of years ago, they switched across to ITS. With the above announcement, they’re now moving a third time to something called Genium INET. We’ll be looking at this new technology in the coming months to review what changes we need to make internally, but the structure of our Market Data System should mean that the change is minimal.
What’s more exciting is that if the competitive markets are introduced, then our Market Data System should again easily support both quote data from those markets and also execution to them giving more options to our members.
Rapid Trader, the first of our products to use our new Market Data System, has been out in the wild now for a month. The uptake of users on this system is encouraging to see. We’re now hard at work on adding some additional features to the product, whilst continuing our work on our existing products being moved across to the new system.
We’re also interested in publishing the programming interface for our Market Data System for clients to use with their own software and programming. If this is something that you might be interested, then please e-mail me with the address craig.foley@mdsfinancial.com.au.
Craig Foley
Chief Information Officer
Presented by Michael Hevern
MDSFinancial
Click here to watch the presentation.
or
Click here to download the mp3 audio recording (1215Kb).
General Advice Only
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In this morning s wrap
SP500 down 0.2%
Labour Figures Disappoint; Greek Fears Resurface;
Dollar Index: Steady
US$ Lower;
A$ down 88.84
FTSE: up 1.2% – Consolidates?
UK: Financials Led by RBS; Miners Down;
DAX down 1.5% & CAC down 2.1%
CHINA: up 1.3%
China: Property Prices to Correct;
Hang Seng down 0.3%;
Oil: down 2.1% ($78)
Resistance?
Gold: up 0.9% ($1105)
Commodities Lower;
Dollar Lower
SPI Futures up 11 or 0.2% (Support?)
O/S Markets Will Drive Trading
ASX News
IFL profits up sharply
ORG f cast 15% growth in underlying FY profit
TOL shocks with 32% fall in 1H profit; Loses $1bn in market cap.
LLC – $806m capital raising (@$7.70); Net Profit up 1.3%; Upbeat
RHC f cast 18%-20% growth in underlying FY profit; 1H profit up 46%
ANZ saw cash profits up 16% $1.6bn; FY provisions down 35%
Reporting:
Fri AGL, CWN, HVN, QBE,WOW, ANZ (update)
ASX to open flat (Friday closing Options early)
US & UK flat leads
The US markets closed slightly lower after recovering from early falls following a weaker than expected jobs report. The Dow closed down 53 points or 0.5% at 10,321, the S&P500 was down 2 points or 0.2% at 1102 and the Nasdaq was down 2 points or 0.1% at 2234.
Leading e-health company Pro Medicus (PME) today announced the signing of a $2 million agreement to provide its entire suite of software and services – including its new Visage thin client PACS – to Sydney-based independent imaging provider Southern Radiology.
It is anticipated that in excess of 60% of the total deal value will be realised in this financial year with the balance being amortised over the next four years, comprising service and e-health transaction revenue. Southern Radiology is a rapidly growing independent radiology provider, with nine practices in the inner suburbs of Sydney. Imaging services include general and dental x-rays, fluoroscopy/screening, ultrasound, mammography with sub speciality services in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and multi-slice CT scans including Cardiac CT.
As part of the deal Pro Medicus will install its Visage 7 PACS, the company’s next-generation thin client streaming digital imaging solution and newly released Version 7.0 RIS at all Southern Radiology practices. Once deployed, the solution will cater for the full range of Practice Management and Clinical reporting functions including primary diagnosis in both 2-dimension and 3-dimension as well as image archiving and distribution. The solution, by virtue of its thin client technology, will also enable Southern Radiology to be the first to provide referrers with the ability to remotely access, view and manipulate their patients’ images in both 2D and 3D.
“We are delighted to be in business partnership with such an innovative organisation as Southern Radiology,” said Pro Medicus Chief Executive Officer David Chambers. “This will be an excellent showcase for our entire suite of products and will provide us with a highly visible Sydney-based reference site for our technology.”
Dr Jonathan Seeff, senior partner at Southern Radiology, said: “Our practice is growing rapidly, particularly in the areas of subspecialty reporting. This means that our MRI or CT experts need to report cases from across our entire network regardless of which practice they are at that day. We looked at a number of conventional 2D web-based systems but soon realised that they could not provide us with the solution we require, as some the data sets we need to report remotely can be up to a few gigabytes in size. “Pro Medicus, with its thin client streaming technology, enables us to view even the largest image data sets without having to move them across our network. It has provided us with the technological step change that we were looking for, not to mention that it will provide us with a strategic advantage in terms of how we make our images available to our referrers. It is the next generation in digital imaging technology.”
Bathurst Resources Limited (BTU) announced two acquisitions, one in the US and the other in New Zealand.
Bathurst Resources Limited has signed an agreement to acquire BD Acquisition LLC which owns the Black Diamond Coal Mine and its exploration interests in the Appalachian Basin Coal Field in Kentucky, USA. This acquisition is a major accomplishment for Bathurst as it represents a first class operating coal operation, in a strategically strong geographic location with new and modern infrastructure. The operation boasts substantial resources/reserves and excellent exploration potential. Bathurst has undertaken detailed discussions with various coal parties on both sale of coal product and on use of the spare capacity at the coal preparation facilities on a cost-plus basis and has secured offers of more than US$60 per ton for 12500 BTU coal and US$70 per ton for stoker coal.
Bathurst has signed an agreement to acquire the stock and assets of BD Acquisition LLC, subject to final due diligence. The full terms of the Agreement are confidential, however the final consideration is expected to be between US$40 and US$60million. Bathurst has contracted Hyde Park Capital Group and Charlotte Capital Partners Inc to raise the monies through mezzanine finance at a project level. The consideration comprises an initial US$3M payment which will be non refundable to Bathurst should Bathurst not complete the transaction, US$42M to be paid at completion, and a deferred payment of US$10M linked to future coal prices.
In a second unrelated deal Bathurst Resources signed an agreement with L&M Coal Holdings to joint venture and ultimately acquire an outstanding hard coking coal asset in the Buller coal field in NZ through the acquisition of 100% of L&M Coal Limited. The acquisition of this advanced exploration asset would complement the recently announced acquisition of the Black Diamond Coal Mine putting Bathurst in an exceptional position in two different regions with two quality operations.
The Buller Coalfield on the West Coast of the South Island of New Zealand is one of the country’s most significant fields and is particularly well known for its production of very high quality, low ash, coking coals that command premium prices on world markets. The 125 year history of mining in the field continues with the current production of a range of coking and thermal coal, much of which is currently exported. Coal mining is a significant part of the NZ economy and facilities for export from the West Coast coalfields are extensive. Railway lines service the entire West Coast coal mining industry and connect to both river and deep water ports.
Bathurst and L&M Coal Holdings have signed a Letter of Intent whereby Bathurst will work in a joint venture with L&M Coal to develop the Buller Project as well as providing Bathurst the sole and exclusive right to execute a sale and purchase agreement to acquire all of the shares in L&M Coal, the agreement of which is to be completed by the 30th April 2010. Following the acquisition of the project, Bathurst would pursue a joint listing on the New Zealand stock exchange. The Letter of Intent does not impose any financial or other commitment at this stage on Bathurst.
The directors of WHK Group Limited (WHG) are pleased to advise that agreement has been reached to acquire the Perth based accounting firm, Hayes Knight (WA) Pty Ltd, under purchase (tuck-in) arrangements with existing member firm WHK Horwath Perth. Core member firm, WHK Horwath Perth has reached agreement to acquire and merge with Hayes Knight WA, a highly regarded accounting firm with 4 directors, 24 staff and annual revenue of around $3.5 million.
The merged firm will have 14 principals, around 110 staff and annual revenue of approximately $18 million, consolidating its position as a pre-eminent mid-tier accounting firm in the growing Perth market. The acquired business will continue to operate from its existing premises in the inner Perth suburb of Osborne Park, under the name WHK Horwath Perth. This city fringe office will allow for future growth of the merged firm without having to expand the existing CBD premises. The transaction is expected to be effective from 1 April 2010 and involves the payment of cash and the issue of approximately 630,000 WHK Group shares.
This transaction is consistent with WHK Group’s growth strategy of supporting the development and expansion of core member firms into major businesses with a competitive advantage through scope and scale of operations as part of a national listed business and financial services group. When completed, this transaction will increase total acquired revenue in the current financial year to approximately $5.8 million.
