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Platinum Asset Management soared 12.6 per cent after confirming Regal Partners had put forward a buyout bid. Under the proposed deal, Platinum’s shareholders would receive 0.274 Regal shares and a dividend of 24¢.
The laggards
While no sector fell, miners (up 0.1 per cent) were the weakest on the local bourse after the sector was weighed down by a weak Chinese economy, as well as rare earth mining companies recording some of the deepest losses.
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Harvey Norman (down 2 per cent) was the worst-performing large-cap stock, followed by Evolution Mining (down 2 per cent), Newmont (down 1.8 per cent) and Lynas Rare Earths (down 1.2 per cent).
The lowdown
The index hit a record 8148.8 points just after 11am before retreating. Overnight on Wall Street, the Dow and S&P 500 reset records, climbing 0.6 per cent and 0.1 per cent, respectively, as investors bid up bets the Fed will cut interest rates by 50 basis points this week. The market, and economists, have fully priced in a cut of at least 25 basis points.
The probability of a 50 basis point cut is 67 per cent, according to CME Futures data, up from 50 per cent on Friday and 25 per cent a month ago. The probability of a 25 basis point cut has fallen to 33 per cent, down from 50 per cent on Friday and 75 per cent a month ago.
The Nasdaq Composite slipped 0.5 per cent as big technology stocks and other market superstars gave back a bit of their big gains from recent years. Apple fell after a soft assessment of pre-order sales of the new iPhone 16 series from Ming-Chi Kuo, an analyst at TF International Securities.
Tweet of the day
Quote of the day
“What we saw happen was the Greens party, who say they care about young people, who say they care about housing – look at them scurrying away from what they’ve just done – voting, not just with Peter Dutton and the Coalition, but with Senator Pauline Hanson and One Nation,” said Murray Watt after the Senate defeated the government’s housing bill.
“We’ve had the extreme right of Australian politics and the extreme left of Australian politics pair up. For what purpose? To stop young Australians from being able to buy a home.”