News

Closer to home, the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) left the cash rate at the record low 0.1% and made no changes to its QE programme at its last monthly meeting for 2020.

Pfizer climbed after its shot was cleared for deployment in the U.K. as soon as next week.

The Fortescue share price has jumped 13% yesterday – investors have been buying Fortescue and other iron ore producers after the spot price of the steel making ingredient climbed to a six-year high.

The US market (measured by the S&P 500 index) rallied +10.7%, while the Australian market (ASX 200) gained 9.9%, its best month on record. The NZ market (NZX 50) lagged in a relative sense, but was still up +5.8% for the month

Treasury Wine Estates plummeted -11% on Friday after Beijing said it would impose tariffs of 107–212% on Australian wine imports after alleging dumping into the Chinese market.

Gains were driven by news that AstraZeneca became the latest firm to deliver positive vaccine developments.

Closer to home, the Kiwi dollar lifted more than half a US cent and touched 70 cents, after finance minister Grant Robertson proposed adding house prices to the RBNZ’s mandate, dashing remaining expectations of interest rate cuts (all else equal, higher r

In other news, President Xi congratulated Biden on his election victory and said China wants to advance a “healthy and stable” relationship and uphold principles of “no conflict” and “no confrontation”. It remains to be seen if the US-China relationship w

Global markets were mixed in very quiet trade overnight as the US markets were closed for Thanksgiving holiday.