The market is up 44. The SFE Futures suggested a 5 point rise in the market this morning.

Resources up a touch today, BHP up 19c to 3659c and RIO up 64c to 10033c. Metals mostly up overnight, Aluminium up 1.4%, Zinc up 0.8% and Copper 1.3%. Nickel down 0.1%. Zinifex up 65c to 1980c. Oil price unchanged at $71.41. There has been another attack on an oil facility in Nigeria. Officials said gunman attacked an oil rig and kidnapped 5 workers. Woodside up 75c to 4665c.

The US markets was closed overnight for the 4 July Independence Day holiday. It would have prompted a few people to take the whole week off. US expected to have thin trade for the rest of this week….although rather than quieten the index down it often leads to even more volatile swings as price movements go unchecked.

  • Lots of press today about BHP Billiton’s (BHP) announcement of approval for the Pyrennes project off shore WA which will cost $1.7bn, add 17% to Australia’s oil output and be in production in 2010. BHP have a 71.43% interest. Lets put it in perspective. Goldman Sachs JB Were say it adds 5c to their valuation of 2157c.
  • Suncorp-Metway (SUN) up 8c to 2033c after they agreed to sell 25% of their RACT Insurance unit to the Royal Automobile Club of Tasmania. SUN is in the middle of integrating Promina and worrying the impact of storms and floods in NSW.
  • The AFR reported this morning that Coca-Cola Amatil (CCL) might have accepted a lower-than-expected price for their South Korean bottling division. It also noted that the Korea Economic Daily reported bidders were offering $509m to $636m compared to its $700m book value. CCL down 13c to 921c.
  • Kagara Zinc (KZL) had a bit of a profits warning yesterday. The stock fell 28c to 611c (-4.4%) but is up 16c to 627c today. They expect profits to be $130m down from previous guidance of $175m. A 25% downgrade. This is the first of a series of what will be currency related profit warnings although Kagara also blamed input prices (up) and zinc prices (down).
  • There is talk of a merger of Zinifex and Oxiana after comments from “Stronger Forever” advocate Owen Hegarty (Oxiana MD) in the AFR today. With Zinifex splitting off their downstream operations they become a much cleaner target – ZFX up 68c to 1982c. OXR up 13c to 348c.
  • Kerry Stoke’s Seven Network (SEV) has upped its stake in West Australian Newspapers (WAN) to 16.1% from 15.01%. He first started buying back in October last year at around 1100c a share. People are still debating whether SEV will make a takeover offer – they can only buy another 3.9% of WAN before they have to make an offer. Are they about to bid, or are they just putting their foot on it. SEV up 12c to 1127c and WAN up 38c to 1470c.
  • Orchard Industrial Property Fund (OIF) listed yesterday – Not the best of starts, just like Multiplex European Property Fund (MUE) and Ellerston Gems Fund (EGF) who also listed this week, they closed at 95c, down 5c from their issue price. They issued 345 million shares at $1 each.
  • Perpetual (PPT) announced today that unless something seriously changes, they will be accepting the offer for Southern Cross Broadcasting (SBC) from both Fairfax (FXJ) and Macquarie Media (MMG). Good for FXJ and MMG. SBC is 1722c, the offer is 1741c. The share price is telling you it’s a done deal.
  • CSR Limited still on the rise after GPG bought a 6% stake. They have an AGM today. The GPG buying has highlighted it as a possible break-up/recovery stock. Price up 8c to 362c. It is up from 337c this week.

In today’s edition of MARCUS TODAY we have an article ‘Results Season Drivers’ looking ahead to the results season. When you know what the big drivers have done in the last Q it’s pretty easy to guess which stocks are going to have good news and which will have bad.

The Rinker risk free arbitrage is opening up every day as the A$ rises. RIN is now 1873c up 23c today. You can buy 2000 shares and sell them to Cemex at 1950c. There are thousands of 2000 share trades still going through in Rinker as people take advantage of it. If you have not got your head around this issue you should – all the details are on the Marcus Today website for anyone to see and there are some broker names and photos who can take your calls if you want to do the deal. If you want to know any details (and we are fielding a lot of questions) call the Cemex hotline – they are all geared up for it on 1300 721 344.

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