Good afternoon
I have never had more feedback on one of my emails - and hardly ever as controversial! Quite a few smart and knowledgable people gave me their view on St:Barbara´s aquisition….feedback ranged from yes - very expensive stuff - to : This is a great story, and you are seeing only the tip of the iceberg - and the exploration team is outstanding! In any case - I think SBM will need a while to convince the market, that they can add value in the medium term. I will revisite the story in the next few days with hopefully some more info! I really appreciated the feedback!!!!
A little surprising, but certainly welcome, European equities started a big move at lunchtime - probably with US-investors coming into the market. from -0,5% the market moved to +0,8% in less than 2 hours…despite of Iran-crisis not showing any more calm, and Trump´s “state of emergency” against Huawei…Metlas continue their slight upward trend from this morning. Bonds are mixed today. By now, late afternoon, equities are very strong around the world!
The US housing market is in good condition.
There is no real news re the trade war or Iran out today…markets are powering regardless. I guess this tells us, that a lot of money has missed the fantastic 1.Quarter, and is now chasing…or the underlying strength of this market is so strong for other reasons like low interest rates for a much longer time, and / or good corporate earnings. In any case - obviously a lot of underlying strength there!
Gold is under pressure, as you would expect…
Lynas - China has stopped all rare earth imports from Burma, which no doubt, will put upward pressure on their prices. Some Chinese rare earth producers were limit-up in China today - I gues Lynas moved because of this story. No news from the takeover-front I have seen!
Galaxy , Australian producer of lithium and very cashed up, emerges as largest shareholder on Alliance Minerals, a smaller, Australian lithium producers, run by Mark Calderwood ( ex-MD years ago of Perseus ). They took a large placement alongside a Chinese off-take partner, to finance expansion
Have a nice evening
WS