Yesterday, our local market posted a modest gain of 0.2%, its second session of gains. While the market started off slowly, it rose in the afternoon after the latest inflation reading, which showed that the price we paid for goods and services over the past year had lifted by 6.1%. That’s the strongest lift we’ve seen in two decades, however it wasn’t as hot as consensus’ expectation of 6.3%. This means in next Tuesday’s RBA meeting, we’re more likely going to see a 0.5% rate hike rather than the 0.75% originally expected.

Looking at the sector performances, six of the 11 sectors ended higher, including healthcare, financials, and consumer discretionary. The gains in these sectors offset the losses we saw in some mining and energy stocks. 

The biggest gainer on the ASX200 was once again BNPL stock Zip (ASX:ZIP), which was up 21%. Sezzle (ASX:SZL) also jumped a massive 96%, after no news out from the company. The stock then subsequently finished the day in a trading halt. Other top performer’s included BrainChip (ASX:BRN), Silver Lake Resources (ASX:SLR) and Iress (ASX:IRE). The worst-performing stock was City Chic Collective (ASX:CCX), which closed 5.1% lower, followed by shares in Champion Iron (ASX:CIA) and BlueScope Steel (ASX:BSL).

The most traded stocks by Bell Direct clients yesterday included National Australia Bank (ASX:NAB), Pilbara Minerals (ASX:PLS) and Whitehaven Coal (ASX:WHC).

Moving to the US, equities rallied after the US Fed announced its much anticipated 0.75% rate increase in its efforts to fight inflation, however left the door open about the size of the rate move at its next meeting in September. Investors were also encouraged after the central bank noted that it doesn’t believe the economy is currently in a recession. We saw the Dow Jones close over 400 points higher, the S&P500 up 2.6% and the Nasdaq up 4.1%. 

What to watch today:

• In line with the positive session in the US, the ASX200 is expected to rise 0.77% at the open if you go by the SPI futures.
• In economic news, preliminary retail sales for June will be released at 11:30am AEST. 
• Reporting wise, Fortescue Metals (ASX:FMG), Mineral Resources (ASX:MIN), Pilbara Minerals (ASX:PLS) and Sandfire Resources (ASX:SFR) will be reporting their quarterly production results. And Ai-Media Technologies (ASX:AIM) and Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield (ASX:URW) will be reporting their earnings results.
• Moving to commodities, oil prices rose over 2%. The gold price reversed its recent losses and traded in the green after the Fed announced its rate hike. And the spot iron ore price trades 5.8% higher at US$110 a tonne. 
• Mineral exploration company, Coolabah Metals will be debuting on the ASX today, trading under the ticker code CBH. 
• Australian Agricultural Company (ASX:AAC) will be holding its AGM today.
• If you hold Clime Capital (ASX:CAM), Sunland Group (ASX:SDG) or Turners (ASX:TRA) you will receive your dividend payment today.

Trading Ideas:

• Citi have maintained its Buy rating on Rio Tinto (ASX:RIO) with a price target of $120. After market close yesterday, RIO reported weak first half results with an underlying EBITDA of US$15.6b, which was 3% below consensus and 10% lower than Citi’s expectations. The group reported first half 2022 EPS of 533 US cents and an interim dividend of 267 US cents per share, which implies a 50% payout against market expectations of 65-70% payout. Now, at its current share price of $96.98, this implies about 24% share price growth in a year.   At its current share price of $96.98, this implies about 24% share price growth in a year.   
• Trading Central has a bullish signal on Lake Resources (ASX:LKE) indicating that the stock price may rise from the close of $0.74 to the range of $0.97 - $1.03 in the next 26 days according to standard principals of technical analy