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Australia Market(2017-03-16)

Australia
2017-03-16 10:33

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Aurizon Holdings Limited (AZJ):
 
New Aurizon boss Andrew Harding has reignited the company’s interest in the Galilee Basin with the delivery of a funding proposal to the Northern Australian Infrastructure Facility that would see the company build the rail link needed to open Queensland coal’s next horizon. Less than a year ago Aurizon shut down work on a plan to build a Galilee rail link, absorbing some shareholder anxiety and a $30 million write-down along the way. Now, it has worked up a new $1.25 billion proposal, which was delivered to NAIF on Wednesday morning, that again sees it in direct competition with Adani Group, the Indian conglomerate that plans to pioneer progress in the Galilee through its bitterly contested Carmichael coal project. Aurizon’s funding application would seem to create a dilemma for Federal Resources Minister, Matt Canavan, who has been gifted with responsibility for the NAIF and who has been an influential supporter of the Carmichael project through its long, difficult and still incomplete gestation. As recently as Tuesday Canavan told reporters in Tokyo that the NAIF was actively considering Adani’s application for public investment in the form of a $1 billion loan.
 
Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (ANZ); Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA); National Australia Bank Limited (NAB); Westpac Banking Corporation (WBC):
 
Foreign exchange traders at ANZ and Westpac disclosed confidential details of their own clients’ pending orders to other FX traders, using code names to identify who their clients were. The extraordinary revelations emerged after the Australian Securities and Investment Commission entered into enforceable undertakings with the two banks, which will see them forced to overhaul the way their wholesale FX businesses operate. But the two banks will get off with a financial slap on the wrist, making a donation of just $3 million each to Financial Literacy Australia. ANZ and Westpac’s big four rivals, Commonwealth Bank and National Australian Bank, have already entered enforceable undertakings with the corporate watchdog after being found to have front run their clients. CBA and NAB agreed to donate a combined $5 million towards financial literacy. Mr Manning said ANZ Banking Group would be the biggest beneficiary among the major banks of Basel 4, because it has the lowest market share and slowest growth rate for investor lending. It will also be able to undercut Commonwealth Bank and Westpac, which have a larger proportion of loans written before the boom, because Basel 4 prevents them adjusting LVRs for rising asset values, The Reserve Bank sent a strong signal this week it favours tougher lending rules rather than interest rate hikes to tackle the problem. The banks are also policing the issue themselves. CBA also said this week it planned to increase deposits required and interest rates for investor loans. Ironically, this is good news for the banks as it increases their profitability and reduces the risks of defaults, which are incredibly low already. The other problem with the debate is that the affordability issue is confined to inner-city pockets of the major capitals, but a proposed crackdown on investor lending would apply to the market as a whole. Bank chiefs such as Westpac chief Brian Hartzer and ANZ’s Shayne Elliott are worried about the glut of poor quality inner-city apartments being snapped up by Chinese investors.
 
BHP Billiton Limited (BHP); Rio Tinto Limited (RIO); South32 Limited (S32):
 
Shareholders in BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto believe the management of those companies have learnt the lessons from their failed investments over the past decade and are likely to return strong dividends to shareholders in the years ahead. Rebounding commodity prices allowed BHP and Rio to reduce their net debt by $US6 billion ($7.9 billion) and $US4.2 billion respectively over the past year, and both companies opted to pay higher-than-expected dividends last month. The stronger balance sheets have raised the prospect of mergers and acquisitions, but David Whitten from Sydney-based Henderson Global Natural Resources Fund said he was ‘‘particularly positive’’ about the capital discipline being demonstrated by the big miners. BHP Billiton will employ temporary workers at its Escondida copper mine in Chile and restart operations, after striking workers again rejected an invitation to return to negotiations. The world’s largest copper mine will first resume work in two areas of the mine that are unrelated to the current talks, Escondida mine president Marcelo Castillo said at a news conference in the city of Antofagasta. The company will then begin additional maintenance work before finally re-establishing mining operations and restarting copper production. Mr Whitten said dividends from big miners should ‘‘surge’’ for several years yet. ‘‘We believe at the very minimum, under existing management teams, over the next two to three years, investors could expect high cash returns as these miners finally benefit from the heavy investments over the last decade,’’ he said on Wednesday, extending the comments to Glencore, South32 and Anglo American.
 
Coziron Resources Limited (CZR); Energy Metals Ltd (EME); Gascoyne Resources Limited (GCY); Lion One Metals Limited (LLO); Millennium Minerals Limited (MOY):
 
Mark Creasy set to join billionaire ranks Mark Creasy shows little sign of giving up his endless search for the next big mining deal. Creasy has shares in Lion One Metals, a Canadian development and exploration company with a focus on its 100-per-cent-owned Tuvatu Gold Project in Fiji. The Fijian government gave the project a ‘‘green light’’ in late 2015 and Lion One shares on the ASX have performed well since. The stock is up almost 140 per cent in the past year. Two other stocks in Creasy’s portfolio to have doubled in value in 12 months are Millenium Metals, which is up about 105 per cent, and the smaller Coziron Resources. Millenium Metalsis a Perth scrap metal company. Coziron owns 85 per cent of three iron ore projects in Western Australia, while Creasy himself owns the remaining15percent. Creasy also holds shares in gold explorer Gascoyne Resources, which is up 63 cent in 12 months, and uranium explorer Energy Metals, which has risen 80 per cent in the same time.
 
Dexus Property Group (DXS); Lendlease Group (LLC):
 
Property powerhouses Dexus and Lendlease have joined a crush of medical property landlords to vie for control of a $180 million hospital portfolio owned by Evolution Healthcare. The interest shown by the two property giants – better known for their investment into more traditional real estate sectors – is one of the strongest signs yet of a rapid maturing of the healthcare property sector. Dexus has been quietly moving into healthcare property after acquiring an Adelaide facility for $42 million, while Lendlease has also been quietly warming its aspirations in the secto.
 
GPT Group (GPT):
 
Shares in GPT group rose 3.1 percent after Credit Suisse analyst Mikhail Mole upgraded the stock to outperform and lifting the price target to $5.35, saying it was too cheap to ignore.
 
Myer Holdings Limited (MYR):
 
Tesla said in a statement on Wednesday that it had just opened a pop-up store for its Tesla electric vehicles on the ground floor of the Myer department store in the Adelaide CBD because of growing interest in its vehicles in the state.
(Source: AIMS)
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