Shrinking ASX looking worse this year, despite appetite for equity deals

News Snapshot:

From what we hear, buying in these bookbuilds is coming from domestic institutions flush with recent dividend payments and not wanting to pay $120 for CBA shares, $9.50 for Origin Energy, or $33 for Goodman Group, and global investors who have rethought their pan-Asia exposure and decided Australia is a safer bet than China. The former are price-sensitive – trading less than they were last year (a quiet year) as shown by the fact cash equities volumes are flat despite the market’s 7.5 per cent jump, and are waiting for dips or discounted raisings. The latter are helping send CBA...