Closing Bell: Joy as LTR Pharma stands proud and delight as ASX diggers inject miner surprise - Stockhead (2024)

• Aussie shares rally, ending 0.5pc higher on Friday
• Tech the only sector to miss out
• LTR Pharma a standout performer among the wee caps

Aussie shares kicked ahead in the moist machinations of a Friday arvo in Sydney as gains among consumer, gold and iron ore stocks outgunned weakness in the local tech sector.

The S&P/ASX200 closed 38.20 points or 0.49% higher to 7,860 points.

For the week the ASX200 has jumped more than 2% and is currently 0.65% off of its 52-week high.

Consumer Discretionary stocks were slightly ahead of the Material Sector at the closing bell, both in and around 1% higher.

Ten out of 11 ASX sectors were in the green late in the session, IT stocks the only laggard.

ASX Sectors on Friday at 4pm

Local stocks tracked.

Iron ore major Fortescue rose 1.5 per cent to $24.42, with BHP up 1.1 per cent to $44.55.

On Wall Street, US stocks shadowed record highs with the May US payrolls report scheduled for release on Friday.

New small capper, LTR Pharma (ASX:LTP) has smashed being a public comapny on the ASX, jumping circa 40% after it reported “extremely positive” trial results in for its alt-Viagra nasal spray.

The stock floated at 20¢ per share last December and added 38 per cent on Friday’s trial results to 89¢ per share on a market value around $64mn.

The clinical study involved 18 dudes taking the SPONTAN spray vs a standard verdenafil pills. LTR says its drug was more effective.

ASX Sectors Weekly Performance

The major goldies were amongst the runs again. This time it was the turn of Regis Resources (ASX:RRL), Bellevue Gold (ASX:BGL) and Newmont Corporation (ASX:NEM) all adding over 3% and to a lesser extent Evolution Mining (ASX:EVN) which was ahead by almost 2% at 3.30pm.

The gold price added 1% overnight to a two-week high.

Best of the benchmark index were IDP Education (ASX:IEL) and Boss Energy (ASX:BOE) , up 5.6% and 3.9%, respectively.

The ASX will be closed on Monday because a Republic would rob us of such.

Top 10 XJO stocks on Friday

NOT THE ASX

The big news overnight was that the ECB went ahead with the highly anticipated 25 basis point cut to the banks key rate.

The key rate now sits at 3.75%, after sitting at a record 4% for donkeys.

Money markets had fully priced in the 25 basis point move lower at the June gathering. It is the first cut since September 2019, when the deposit facility was in negative territory.

ECB Legende and boss Christine Lagarde told the press conf. that EU inflation has improved “markedly” and reckoned there’s a “strong likelihood” that the ECB is shifting into a “dialling-back phase”.

In the states US stocks went sideways late in proceedings having hit earlier record highs.

Then it was wait and see for punters ahead of the big May non-farm payrolls numbers due out Friday US time.

The S&P 500 was flat.

The Nasdaq lost 0.1% while the Dow Jones added an aloof 0.2%

In company news, Nvidia went nuts to a new record and then there was some profit taking and much rejoincing.

Lululemon closed circa 5% higher after the sports-fashion retailer logged solidly better than expected Q1 numbers.

Among the S&P500 sectors, Utilities finished down 1% whiles Consumer Discretionary added 1%. As did ours.

ASX SMALL CAP LEADERS

Today’s best performing small cap stocks:

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Killing it casually on Friday was Jayride (ASX:JAY) after providing a trading update on its airport transfer marketplace business that showed that “contribution profit continued to increase on a lower passenger trips base”, which the company says is a validation of its recently updated business strategy.

As mentioned earlier, LTR Pharma (ASX:LTP) had a firm grip on the winner’s list after the news from its recent primary and secondary clinical studies for its Spontan erectile dysfunction spray.

“Initial data showed that Spontan’s nasal spray reached the same Cmax (maximum concentration) level as an oral administration, despite being administered at a lower dose, with volunteers showing observable effects of the drug in as little as 9 minutes, with an average of 12 minutes across the study compared to 56 minutes (Tmax) in patients receiving oral treatment.”

RemSense Technologies (ASX:REM)was the early leader on Friday morning, climbing nicely on news of a new contract with Chevron Australia to undertake virtualplant high-resolution photogrammetry scanning and image processing of Chevron’s Gorgon LNG Train 1 in northwestern Australia for a contract value of $534,195.33.

Dreadnought Resources (ASX:DRE)was up early on news that mineralogical work at its Gifford Creek Carbonatite – part of DRE’s 100% owned Mangaroon Critical Minerals project – has confirmed that the dominant niobium mineral is pyrochlore, which is a high niobium mineral (>50%) from which ~95% of global niobium is produced.

Finally, the gold developerMetalsTech (ASX:MTC)says a key condition has been satisfied for its ~$120m (~A$0.639 per share) acquisition by Trans Metals Fund, following the granting of underground mining activity permit No. 2440-3935/2023 for the Sturec Gold Mine.

ASX SMALL CAP LAGGARDS

Today’s best performing small cap stocks:

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IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Mamba Exploration’s (ASX:M24) inaugural drill program at its Canary joint venture project in Canada’s uranium-rich Athabasca Basin has intersected anomalous radiation in a previously untested area.

New World Resources (ASX:NWC) now has a third rig drilling to boost copper resources at its high-grade Antler and Javelin VMS deposits in Arizona. Drilling is also expected to increase resource confidence.

At Stockhead, we tell it like it is. While Mamba Exploration and New World Resources are Stockhead advertisers, they did not sponsor this article.

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