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The local market took lead from Wall Street today, following softer-than-expected inflation data out in America, easing investor fears of further aggressive rate hikes to come from the Fed. The ASX closed the midweek session up 0.67% buoyed by a surge in utilities stocks.

Gold miner St Barbara (ASX:SBM) soared 20% today, after the company announced the successful completion of the bookbuild for the conditional placement issuing approximately 229.2m new Genesis Minerals (AXS:GMD) shares to raise $275 million to facilitate the merger of St Barbara and Genesis Minerals. Under the planned merger, St Barbara (ASX:SBM) and Genesis (ASX:GMD) will merge their Leonora District operations in WA to form a new gold company, Hoover House. St Barbara’s other assets will be demerged to form a new junior gold company called Phoenician Metals which focuses on the long-term value of a portfolio including the Atlantic and Simberi operations.

The winning stocks of the session were led by St Barbara (ASX:SBM) adding almost 14% at the closing bell, Block (ASX:SQ2) rallying 8.15% and Chalise Mining (ASX:CHN) adding 6.41%. And on the losing end, Imugene (ASX:IMU) tanked 5.13%, while Endeavour Group (ASX:EDV) fell 4.33% and Bendigo and Adelaide Bank (ASX:BEN) fell 3.31%.

The most traded stocks by Bell Direct clients were Telstra Corporation (ASX:TLS), Arafura Rare Earths (ASX:SRU), Newcrest Mining (ASX:NCM).

On the commodities front crude oil is trading 0.2% lower at US$75.22 per barrel, gold is flat at US$1,809 per ounce, and iron ore is down 2.64% at US$110.50 per tonne.

Aussie dollar is buying 68 US cents, 92.65 Japanese Yen, 55.49 Japanese Yen and NZ$1.06.

Our local market closed 0.8% lower on Friday, dragged down by the real estate, tech and materials sectors, while energy was the only sector to close in the green. It was oil and gas exploration company Karoon Energy (ASX:KAR) that pushed the sector higher, while other stocks that made solid gains included Whitehaven Coal (ASX:WHC), Allkem (ASX:AKE) and Imugene (ASX:IMU). 

 The most traded stocks by Bell Direct clients were IPH (ASX:IPH), Whitehaven Coal (ASX:WHC) and Mineral Resources (ASX:MIN). 

 US equities tumbled following a strong US jobs report that pointed to rate hikes. The US unemployment rate for September declined further, to 3.5%. Now while this was as expected, markets consider what this means for the Fed, and a falling unemployment rate sparks a jump in rates, which weighed on stocks. The 2-year Treasury yield rose 6 basis points. And the three major benchmarks dropped. The Dow Jones closed more than 2% lower, or 600 points. The S&P500 down 2.8% and the Nasdaq sharply fell 3.8%. 

 What to watch today:

• The SPI futures are suggesting the Australian market will drop 0.9% at the open this morning. 

• We may see selling of tech stocks today, following the Nasdaq’s drop of almost 4%. So watch tech companies such as Block (ASX:SQ2) and Xero (ASX:XRO). 

•  In commodities, the price of oil has jumped more than 5%, to a nearly 5-week high, and is trading above US$93 per barrel. OPEC agreed to cut production by 2 million barrels per day, or about 2% of global supply from November. Energy producers will be on watch today, including Santos (ASX:STO) and Woodside Energy (ASX:WDS).Iron ore is trading flat, while the strong US jobs data has put pressure on the gold price, which has dropped almost 1%. So, watch gold miners today. 

Trading Ideas:

• Bell Potter maintain a Speculative Buy rating on Frontier Digital Ventures (ASX:FDV) with a valuation of $1.23. At its current share price of $0.67, this implies 82.2% share price growth in a year. 

• Trading Central have identified a bearish signal in Ten Sixty Four (ASX:X64), indicating that the stock price may fall from the close of $0.60 to the $0.47 to $0.49 over 24 days according to the standard principles of technical analysis.

The local market dipped to a two-month low during today’s session before closing the day down 1.56% at a new 20-day low of 6700.20 points. The key index was weighed down by the materials, real estate and utilities sectors each falling more than 2% today, however every sector ended the midweek session in negative territory as investor sentiment was dampened by the global market sell-off overnight ahead of the Fed’s interest rate decision out tomorrow.

 Coal miners have been on a run this week, none more so than Whitehaven Coal (ASX:WHC), with the company’s shares surging to a record high $9.16 during today’s session. Investors piled in after the coal miner issued a notice of AGM to its shareholders which includes two resolutions seeking shareholder approval to extend the company’s share buy-back programme. For the year, WHC reported WHC is on-track to complete the 1st buy-back ahead of its AGM, where it will seek further approval for an on-market buy-back and an off-market buy-back, which if approved will give the board authorisation to acquire up to 240m shares in aggregate.

 Looking at the best performing stocks today, Washington H Soul Pattinson jumped almost 5% today after releasing FY22 results including cash flows from investments up 93%, net asset value up 71.6% and group regular profit after tax up 154.4%.

Viva Energy (ASX:VEA) shares also rose 4.56% today, while Whitehaven Coal added almost 4%. On the losing side, Imugene (ASX:IMU) tanked 8% today despite announcing that its first patient has been dosed as part of intravenous cohort 1 in the Phase 1 MAST study evaluating the safety of novel cancer-killing virus CF33-hNIS (VAXINA). Sayona Mining (ASX:SYA) and Charter Hall (ASX:CHC) also each fell more than 5% today.

 The most traded stocks by Bell Direct clients today were Whitehaven Coal (ASX:WHC), Block (ASX:SQ2), and Argosy Minerals (ASX:AGY).

 On the economic data front, at 4am Australian eastern time tomorrow the Fed’s latest interest rate decision will be released, which has caused investor confidence to slump this week as markets are torn between expecting a 0.75% and 1% rate hike. Later tomorrow, the Bank of England will release its interest rate decision for the UK, with the market expecting a rise to 2.25% from the current 1.75%.

The local market see-sawed throughout the first trading session of the week before closing the day down 0.28%, led by a sell-off in utilities and tech stocks, while real estate stocks recovered some losses from Friday’s sharp sell-off.

Looking at the best performing stocks today, Lake Resources (ASX:LKE) recovered some of last week’s losses to close 12.37% higher today after the lithium miner released another update on its Kachi Lithium Project to alleviate investor concerns over the dispute with its project partner Lilac Solutions, with Lake Resources today saying that ongoing work is being done by Lilac and all parties are confident that on-site operations will be successful. Other stocks that investors bought into today included Pilbara Minerals (ASX:PLS) and a number of other lithium producers today as investors pile into the EV-battery metal sector today. Oz Minerals (ASX:OZL) and Sandfire Resources (ASX:SFR) also each added more than 3% today. Investors sharply sold out of Sayona Mining (ASX:SYA) shares today as today is the first day the company trades as part of the ASX200, while Magellan Financial Group (ASX:MFG) fell 5.75% today and Breville Group (ASX:BRG) lost 5.2%. Investors also fled buy now, pay later stocks today, which saw Block (ASX:SQ2) shares tumble 4.46%, as investors speculate an aggressive rate hike from the Fed’s in the US will be announced on Wednesday.

The top traded stocks by Bell Direct clients today were Pilbara Minerals (ASX:PLS), Lynas Rare Earths (ASX:LYC), BHP Group (ASX:BHP), Fortescue Metals Group (ASX:FMG) and Allkem (ASX:AKE).

Taking a look at economic data, tomorrow is the big release day of the RBA’s September meeting minutes which investors have been anticipating to determine whether the RBA really is dovish about the way forward for lower interest rate hikes or whether they will continue to aggressively act to curb inflation.