By Patrick Avenell
News reporting that Woolworths was set to bid for JB Hi-Fi – which the supermarket giant has completely refuted – may have had a negative impact on JB’s share price yesterday, but the electrical retailer has bounced back today with a strong showing.
It’s hard to quantify how influential the apparently misleading news reports were on the market, but the contrasting fortunes of JB Hi-Fi point to a casual relationship between the two.
Yesterday, with the media abuzz with stories virtually suggesting that a takeover or purchase bid had already been accepted, JB Hi-Fi’s share price dropped a massive $1.22 – or 13.91 per cent – to close at $7.55.
With traders waking up this morning to the knowledge that no such offers had been accepted, and the decisive message from Woolworths that it has “no current intention of entering or entertaining and such discussions” to purchase JB Hi-Fi, there was renewed vigour in JB’s performance.
It’s gone as high as $8.17 today – that was up 8 per cent – and a short time ago was trading at $8. It’s a self evident fact that today’s performance alone has not yet undone the damage caused yesterday, but the upwards direction would be encouraging.
In other live share price news, Clive Peeters has dropped below 7 cents, and was trading at 6.5 cents a short time ago. This is a drop of 13.33 per cent on its close yesterday of 7.5 cents.