Afternoon Report | Miners lead market lower

This is the Fear and Greed Afternoon Report - everything you need to know about what happened in the markets, economy and world of business today, in just a few minutes.

1. ASX closes down

2. ACMA sues Optus

3. Virgin Money sold

4. Eraring station extended

5. Nvidia boom profit

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to the Fear and Greed Business News Afternoon Report
for Thursday, the twenty third of May twenty twenty four,
by Michael Thompson. Every afternoon, we've got the five stories
that happened today that you need to know about. So
let's get going. Story number one. The SMPASX two hundred
closed down almost half a percent today to seven eight
hundred and twelve points. Techtocks did well while the big

(00:24):
miners went backwards. BHP led the way down, dropping two
and a half percent after it emerged that Anglo American
had knocked back a third bid from the Big Australian.
BHP now has another week to make a further bid
if it chooses to do so. Rio, Tinto, Fortesque and
West Farmers were all sharply lower. NAB was the worst
of the banks. On the positive side of the market,

(00:46):
CSL did well, jumping one point four percent, as did Transurban.
Telstra was up one point one percent. In corporate news,
New farm dropped seven percent after a slump in profits
and revenue in the face of quote challenging conditions. In
its latest half year report, Zero reported surging revenue in
the twelve months to the end of March, sending its
share price up nearly nine percent, the best on the day.

(01:08):
Story number two. The Communications regulator is suing Optus for
allegedly not protecting customers confidential information ahead of the September
twenty twenty two cyber attack. The Australian Communications and Media
Authority filed proceedings in the Federal Court claiming Optus failed
to protect the confidentiality of personally identifiable information of its

(01:30):
customers from unauthorized interference or access. It is, of course,
the latest legal battle for Optus, which is also fighting
to stop a report commission from Deloitte into the twenty
twenty two attack from being released as part of class
action proceedings brought by Slater and Gordon. Story number three.
Shareholders in Virgin Money, Britain's sixth largest bank that's listed

(01:51):
on the ASX, have voted for a five point five
billion dollar takeover offer and the group will leave the
Exchange Building Society Nationwide will buy Virgin Money, which is
listed here and in London. About half the shareholders are
Australia based. Virgin Money was created by the merger of
Virgin and Clydesdale and Yorkshire Banking Group in twenty eighteen.

(02:11):
The latter was a subsidiary of NAB, but was spun
off in twenty sixteen when NAB exits in Britain, so
NAB shareholders got stock in Clydesdale in Yorkshire, hence the
listing here Story number four. The New South Wales government
will extend the life of Origin Energy's Arahring coal fired
power station for at least two more years until August
twenty twenty seven, at a cost of up to two

(02:33):
hundred and twenty five million dollars a year. This comes
after warnings the shift to renewable energy has fallen off track.
Under the deal, Origin will seek to generate a minimum
of six terrawa hours a year, about three percent of
total generation in the Eastern States national electricity market, from
the giant plant on the shores of New South Wales

(02:54):
Lake Macquarie. According to the Financial Review, Origin will pay
a fifth of any operating profits up to a maxim
of forty million dollars a year should the plant operate
at a profit during the extension period, but if Ara'ring
has run at a loss, Origin can call on the
state to subsidize the plants operating capital costs and finally
story number five record sales of artificial intelligence chips since

(03:18):
Nvidia's revenue soaring two hundred and sixty two percent in
the past quarter, ahead of already lofty expectations, and the
group expects growth to continue with the launch of a
line of new chips. CEO Jensen Huang said the company
wild see a lot of revenue from its new Blackwell
chips this year as it profits from exploding demand for

(03:40):
the computing power behind generative AI. According to a report
in The Financial Times, demand for Nvidia's AI data center
graphics processing units has absolutely surged in the past year
as the big tech companies rush to develop the computing
infrastructure needed to deliver AI products at scale. For the
March quarter, Nvidia was making about twenty nine million US

(04:02):
dollars a day in revenue, and video shares are up
around ninety percent this year and jump six percent in
after hours trading to push through one thousand US dollars
a share. The company also announced a ten for one
stock split. That's it for the afternoon report for Thursday,
the twenty third of May twenty twenty four, will be
back tomorrow morning with the Friday edition of Fear and greed.

(04:23):
I'm Michael Thompson to enjoy your evening,