Market wraps 17th August 2020
Morning Bell - Paulina Peters
The benchmark S&P/ASX200 looks set to start the week in the red with the futures suggesting a 0.95% drop at the open. This follows a reasonably underwhelming finish to the week on Wall Street, with stocks closing flat on Friday.
The Gold price fell 1% to US$1,949.80 an ounce on Friday night, this led to the precious metal having its worst week in almost six months.
What to watch this week:
- With the oil price falling, keep an eye on energy producers like Santos (ASX:STO) and Woodside Petroleum (ASX:WPL).
Companies reporting this week:
- The companies reporting today include, WAAAX stock Altium (ASX:ALU), Bendigo & Adelaide Bank (ASX:BEN) and oil and gas production company Beach Energy (ASX:BPT).
- Consumer goods retailer JB Hi-Fi (ASX:JBH) will be releasing its full year results, its share price will be on watch today following the release. Goldman Sachs analysts expect the retailer to report sales of $8.03 billion, this is compared to its guidance of $7.86 billion.
- Other companies reporting this week, include BHP (ASX:BHP), Coles (ASX:COL) and Westpac (ASX:WBC) tomorrow. On Wednesday, look out for the second biggest company on the ASX, CSL (ASX:CSL) who reports, and on Thursday, Wesfarmers (ASX:WES) reports.
Local trading ideas:
- On Friday, National Australia Bank (ASX:NAB) provided a limited 3Q 20 trading update. Bell Potter believes NAB has the foundations in place to cope with COVID-19. They forecast a final FY20 dividend of 20¢ and FY21 interim and final dividends of 40¢ each. Bell Potter’s price target remains at $19.90 price target and their Buy rating also remains unchanged.
- Bell Potter has increased investment management company Praemium’s (ASX:PPS) price target by 5% to 62 cents and maintains its Buy rating on the stock. Praemium reported last Friday. It’s FY20 EBITDA of $14.2m exceeded Bell Potter’s $13.8m estimate. Bell Potter believes PPS has delivered a good result in a difficult environment. Specifically, it is benefitting from increased investment in its Australian business. The company has gained scale and has a material merger with Powerwrap (ASX:PWL) if it is successful with its bid.