Company Interview / Traders want more of these three miners

Gemma Dale from NAB trade shares her views on the trading volumes amidst the reporting season. She observes a surge in volumes during the dramatic volatility week which settled once the reporting season began. Accents are drawn to specific stock activities seen in three major miners, Fortescue (ASX:FMG), BHP (ASX:BHP), and RIO (ASX:RIO). Notably, high volumes and extremely high buying values in these miners, especially BHP, suggest some investors feeling they do not have enough of these stocks, with Fortescue attracting not just traders but long-term buyers.

Continuing her analysis, Gemma shifts focus to banking volumes. She identifies a propensity among investors to trim as banking stocks rise, particularly those of the Commonwealth Bank of Australia (ASX: CBA) which has shown extraordinary behaviour. Though investors show discomfort with banks at high prices and trim at rise, she stipulates a clear unwillingness to completely abandon these stocks. Alike sentiments extend to ASX (ASX:ASX), a stock rarely seen in volumes which has attracted buying interest amidst recent bad news.

Finally, Gemma references Cochlear (ASX: COH) , a surging stock, noting investors’ satisfaction at its doubling share price within a year and their readiness to keep holdings. She notes a contrast in Pro Medicus (ASX:PME), observing a few investors selling the “market darling”. Lastly, she notes the international focus on cybersecurity, remarking astoundingly high valued buyers entering CrowdStrike (NASDAQ:CRWD) despite recent IT hiccups.

Full unedited transcript:

0:11

Let's get all the latest in terms of what NAB trade clients are buying out there Gemma Dell from NAB trade. Joining me. What are volumes. Look at the moment Gemma amidst the reporting season.

0:23

Yeah it's super interesting. We were watching volumes kind of solid tick along for a while there. And then they absolutely exploded with that volatility sort of week before last. And suddenly you know it's just reporting season. It's settled right down. So you sort of got this real offset between what was happening dramatically on the volatility side. And then, you know, the actual news driven more stock specific stuff. It's bringing people back. Now that the volatility settled more broadly. It's interesting. Now we love to talk about Fortescue, you and I and Gemma. Um when you see the big drop that it's had as iron ore is sold off, I mean does that look like a buy. Yeah. This is super fascinating. So it's not just Fortescue. For once, we're starting to see all three of the big miners just getting extraordinary volumes through. So the volumes are absolutely massive, but it's also sort of a 95% by by number of trades and a 99% buy by value. That is quite eye watering, particularly when you look at the sheer amount of money that's

1:22

going through these stocks at the moment. So there are clearly a lot of our investors. It's hard to believe anyone doesn't have enough BHP, but there are people who feel that they don't have enough BHP and at this price they want more. Fortescue has been sort of more of an actively traded stock for quite some time. So at the moment we're getting the traders but also the longer term buyers, they really like it at this price and they are coming in really coming in. What about the banks? I mean CBA beating the street with its results. A lot of people telling us it's behaving like a growth stock. What are you seeing in terms of volume for banks? CBA is extraordinary, isn't it? Right. I guess you never want to underestimate them. It's amazing what their business can do a lot about. Investors are very uncomfortable with banks at these prices. They're quite mixed at the moment. So they were mixed earlier in the week. They tend to trim as they pop again. So the numbers you had on screen a little earlier showing them all green today, they're trimming as they rise, but they're they're reluctant to get rid of them

2:22

completely. And when there's a little bit of weakness we do see some buying. So it's not the people are ready to get rid of them completely. They're just they're very reluctant to keep holding as they keep rising. I think it does take a little trim there. Obviously moving back into the miners. That's where they're going. Yeah. From the banks to the miners. It's always that trade isn't it. Let's have a look at ASX. It reported today but it's also being sued by ASIC. What sort of volumes are you seeing there. Yeah amazing. ASX is one of those stocks we very very rarely see in the numbers. Right. Even though a couple of our very, very, uh, sophisticated traders have enjoyed working with ASX for some time, they really like the stock because they just felt the cash holdings were so incredible. Uh there's been a lot of bad news right through the company. Penny. And, uh, not a lot of active trading apart from that handful of people who have been watching it for quite a while. At the moment they were saying buying, and it's been the first time for some time that people are buying and they're relatively enthusiastic. I think the, uh, the

3:22

ASIC news sort of gave it a little hit that they, they took as an opportunity to jump in. Okay, let's have a look at some of the other big companies that have reported this week. And I was fortunate enough to speak to both the CEOs. You're looking at paramedics and cochlear starting with cochlear. I mean, it's so extraordinary what they're doing, particularly in terms of research and development. But you're seeing a strong buyer, but not a lot of trades going through. Cochlear amazes me because we talk about CSL all the time. CSL and cochlear were sort of the two big ones for quite a while there. We stopped talking about cochlear and I love your charts. Thank you for doing that. It's roughly doubled in a little over 12 months. The share price, no one is talking about it, which I find fascinating. It just has not come up on our radar in terms of what investors are looking at. They if they held it, they've just taken the rise. They haven't trimmed through this, which is quite interesting. They're very happy to keep holding. Obviously the multiple that it's sitting on is quite extraordinary at this point. Uh, yesterday, uh, with reports out, they were quite happy to buy it.

4:22

Very, very interesting, small volume. It wasn't a huge number of people, but it was sort of a 99% buy for a stock that we have not seen in the top 20 probably for 12 months. Yeah. Extraordinary. But a lot of analysts saying very expensive as well. Okay. Pro Medicus, that was another one. I mean this is sort of a market darling. I think one analyst said you can't not have a buy on Pro Medicus, but you've been seeing some selling parameters again. Fascinating. So these two both stand out for me because they just, despite exceptional performance, are just not showing up in their numbers at all. Haven't for quite some time. ProMedica is obviously not showing up because anyone who bought it is just not touching it, right. They're happy to hold on to it for dear life because it's quite a ride and it's a good ride. They've really enjoyed it and yet we've seen a little bit of trimming, right? I think people go, wow, that is quite a number. I have done extremely well. I'm happy to take a little off the table. Maybe they're just rebalancing their portfolios. When you get something in there that's a ten bagger, it can kind of blow out your allocations. And

5:21

and so we might see a tiny rotation back to something else. But those two stocks we very very rarely see and we're just seeing them at the moment. What about internationally I mean a lot of focus on cyber security. What some of the trading like at CrowdStrike I this you've got to laugh, right. I like the company nearly brought the global global everything to its knees. Uh, the number of companies and the number of industries that were dramatically affected by the outage was just extraordinary. And then they offered everybody a $10 Uber Eats voucher, which I still stands out as one of the more extraordinary compensation programs you could ever wish to, uh, to visit upon your customers when that's what you did to them, uh, strong by, super strong by, and very, very, very high value buyers going into that company at the moment It's amazing to me, but someone is seeing some real value there and they're getting into it.