Markets Overview

  • ASX SPI 200 futures up 0.1% to 6,981.00
  • Dow Average down 0.2% to 32,669.43
  • Aussie little changed at 0.6397 per US$
  • U.S. 10-year yield little changed at 4.0544%
  • Australia 3-year bond yield fell 3.5 bps to 3.26%
  • Australia 10-year bond yield rose 0.8 bps to 3.76%
  • Gold spot up 0.9% to $1,648.28
  • Brent futures up 1.9% to $94.56/bbl

Economic Events

  • 11:00: (AU) Australia to Sell A$800 Million 2.75% 2028 Bonds
  • 11:30: (AU) Sept. Investor Loan Value MoM, est. -3.0%, prior -4.8%
  • 11:30: (AU) Sept. Home Loans Value MoM, est. -3.0%, prior -3.4%
  • 11:30: (AU) Sept. Owner-Occupier Loan Value MoM, est. -2.5%, prior -2.7%
  • 11:30: (AU) Sept. Private Sector Houses MoM, prior 4.1%
  • 11:30: (AU) Sept. Building Approvals MoM, est. -10.0%, prior 28.1%

Stocks finished lower as data showing a solid US labor market bolstered speculation that Federal Reserve policy could remain aggressively tight even with the threat of a recession.

At a time when good news is considered bad news when it comes to policy conjectures, the S&P 500 wiped out a rally as the figures highlighted an unexpected rebound in US job openings, which may keep the pressure on the Fed. It was the 26th time in 2022 that the equity gauge erased a gain or loss of at least 1% in one session — the most for any year since the financial crisis.

Two-year US yields — which are more sensitive to imminent Fed moves — topped 4.5% after sliding as much as eight basis points earlier in the day.

Friday’s jobs report is currently forecast to show US employers added about 196,000 workers to payrolls in October. Economists are expecting the unemployment rate to edge up to 3.6%, and for average hourly earnings to post another solid advance.

Other News

A young bar-tailed godwit appears to have set a non-stop distance record for migratory birds by flying at least 13,560 kilometers (8,435 miles) from Alaska to the Australian state of Tasmania, a bird expert said Friday.

The bird was tagged as a hatchling in Alaska during the Northern Hemisphere summer with a tracking GPS chip and tiny solar panel that enabled an international research team to follow its first annual migration across the Pacific Ocean, Birdlife Tasmania convenor Eric Woehler said. Because the bird was so young, its gender wasn’t known.

Aged about five months, it left southwest Alaska at the Yuko-Kuskokwim Delta on Oct. 13 and touched down 11 days later at Ansons Bay on the island of Tasmania’s northeastern tip on Oct. 24, according to data from Germany’s Max Plank Institute for Ornithology. The research has yet to be published or peer reviewed.

The bird started on a southwestern course toward Japan then turned southeast over Alaska’s Aleutian Islands, a map published by New Zealand’s Pukoro Miranda Shorebird Center shows.

The bird was again tracking southwest when it flew over or near Kiribati and New Caledonia, then past the Australian mainland before turning directly west for Tasmania, Australia’s most southerly state. The satellite trail showed it covered 13,560 kilometers (8,435 miles) without stopping.

Guinness World Records lists the longest recorded migration by a bird without stopping for food or rest as 12,200 km (7,580 miles) by a satellite-tagged male bar-tailed godwit flying from Alaska to New Zealand.

That flight was recorded in 2020 as part of the same decade-old research project, which also involves China’s Fudan University, New Zealand’s Massey University and the Global Flyway Network.

The same bird broke its own record with a 13,000-kilometer (8,100-mile) flight on its next migration last year, researchers say. But Guinness has yet to acknowledge that feat.

Woehler said researchers did not know whether the latest bird, known by its satellite tag 234684, flew alone or as part of a flock.

(ABC News)