Evening Wrap: ASX 200 gives back gains, lithium prices hit an all-time high

The S&P/ASX 200 closed 94 points lower, down -1.4%.

The local sharemarket gives back most of last Friday's gains, Chinese lithium carbonate prices hit a fresh all-time high, Hawsons Iron falls more than 50% as surging inflation delays key project studies and US retail traders load up short positions.

Let's dive in.

Markets

Yes we've got a new Evening Wrap table!

The ASX 200 tumbled after Wall Street handballed us an abysmal session. We're still up 0.33% since last Thursday but the volatile turnaround is far from ideal for a market that's trying to find a bottom.

• All 11 sectors declined

• Defensives including Real Estate, Telcos and Industrials were relative outperformers

• Resources led to the downside with Energy falling -2.01% and Materials down -2.21%

• 76% of the top 200 fell

Announcements

• Dreadnought Resources (ASX: DRE) +5.3% confirmed REE carbonite intrusions at its Mangaroon project. RC drilling is ongoing and assay results are expected in November  

• Insurance Australia (ASX: IAG) +1.7% announced an on-market share buy-back for up to $350m funded by a reduction in its Business Interruption provision 

• Endeavour Group (ASX: EDV) +1.5% reported a -6.2% decline in retail segment sales to $2.49bn. Although sales for the Hotel segment jumped 90.8% to $538m

• APA Group (ASX: APA) +0.5% entered into an agreement to potentially acquire Basslink, who owns and operates 370km of high-volatile direct current cable linking the electricity grids of Victoria and Tasmania

• CSL (ASX: CSL) -1.3% reaffirmed its FY23 NPAT guidance of $2.4-2.5bn plus $300-330m from its Vifor acquisition. This represents a 13-18% growth on FY22

• Terracom (ASX: TER) -1.3% posted 2.34m tonnes of coal sales and $180m in EBITDA for the September quarter. The Queensland Government’s new royalty scheme cost the company an additional $56.1m   

• Costa Group (ASX: CGC) -13.4% said it expects full year EBITDA to be marginally ahead of last year. Harvest volumes have been in-line with expectations but “efforts to produce crop in challenging conditions” has resulted in higher costs  

• Adbri (ASX: ABC) -22% advised that CEO Nick Miller will be leaving the role. The company also provided a trading update, now expecting FY23 profits to be $75-85m, down -27.2% to -35.7% compared to FY22

• Hawsons Iron (ASX: HIO) -62.2% plans to ‘slow the pace’ of work on its Hawsons Iron Project Bankable Feasibility Study as a result of surging capital expenditure costs   

Broker updates 

• AdBri (ASX: ABC) UBS rates as Neutral. TP $2.00 from $2.43

• ANZ (ASX: ANZ) Macquarie downgrades to Neutral from Outperform. TP $25.50 from $24 

• Brickworks (ASX: BKW) UBS upgrades to Buy from Neutral. TP $25.30 from $23

• CSR (ASX: CSR) UBS upgrades to Buy from Neutral. TP $6.50 from $6.40

• NAB (ASX: NAB) Macquarie upgrades to Outperform from Neutral. TP $32.25 from $30.25

• Xero (ASX: XRO) Macquarie upgrades to Neutral from Underperform. TP $74 from $70

Economy

It’s a quiet week for economic data. Main things to watch out for will come on Tuesday, including RBA minutes, China's Q3 GDP growth and Germany's ZEW Economic Sentiment Index.

Commodities 

Nothing too exciting on the commodity front. Most base metals and energy commodities trading around breakeven or slightly green after losses last Friday.

• Iron ore futures on the Dalian Commodity Exchange fell -2.4%

• Chinese lithium carbonate prices hit an all-time high of 532,000 yuan (~$118,810) last week, according to Benchmark Mineral Intelligence

Quick bites 

• Spending buoyed by earnings growth: "Average earnings per hour rose 5.0% year-on-year in Q2 in Australia, almost double the pace of the wage price index at 2.6% year-on-year. The strength in hourly earnings growth helps explain why households are still spending in the face of higher rates and inflation," said ANZ research

• Retail traders load up puts: "Last week, retail traders bought US$19.9bn worth of puts to open. They bought only US$6.5bn in calls to open. This is the first time in history that puts were 3x calls," said Jason Goepfert, Chief Research Analyst at SentimenTrader

Source: SentimenTrader

• Freight rates in freefall: Freight rates from Shanghai to Rotterdam and LA have collapsed

Source: SentimenTrader

Latest news

Post market brief

In the Friday Wrap, we talked about how the pullback is just as important as the rally.

Fortunately unfortunately, today was a rather broad-based selloff that reversed most of last Friday's gains. This indicates that the rally was more so fuelled by short covering and put selling, as opposed to genuine buying.

Markets are in an extremely volatile state. From the Quick Bites above, you can see retail traders loading up puts to hedge/profit from any downward moves.

A few more sessions like this and the ASX 200 will once again approach June lows. Which then brings back the conversion of 'do we roll over to the next leg' or do we get another rally from a technically oversold levels. Just bear market things.

Index

S&P/ASX 200: Another rejection around the 50-day moving average. Not ideal for bulls. Still, compared to the US market, we've managed to defend June lows. There's a bit more breathing room before things enter risky territory.

XJO chart (Source: TradingView)

Stocks

Myer: Has managed to hold and consolidate around the 20-day.

Source: TradingView

Data#3: Another name that's managed to hold up pretty well relative to the broader market. Chopping around the 20 and 50-day.

Source: TradingView

Core Lithium: Pushing higher. A few lithium stocks performed quite on Monday thanks to record Chinese lithium carbonate prices. Although the sector at whole remains choppy.

Source: TradingView

Scans