The S&P / ASX200 (ASX: XJO) is down 0.3% in Monday morning trade as investors react to news reports of little progress in resolving the trade dispute between the US and China and the market has few other leads or economic data points to give it direction.
However, there are several well known shares tumbling for different reasons today, so let's take a look at what may be behind their price falls.
The Xero Limited (ASX: XRO) share price is down 3% to $40.73 today despite the online accounting business providing no specific news to the market. Xero shares are still up 33% over the past year and today's price weakness is probably related to the recent heavy sell off on the tech-heavy NASDAQ index in the US. Xero recently announced the GBP5.25 million acquisition of online accounting business Instafile in the UK and recently raised US$300 million to fund further acquisitions as it sees fit.
The Afterpay Touch Group Ltd (ASX: APT) is down 7% to $12 this morning and continues on a volatile ride ever since it became apparent that the buy-now-pay-later consumer credit provider may face stricter regulation in its core Australian market. AfterPay also trades on a large valuation relative to historical revenues and earnings, which means much future success is baked into its current share price.
The Cash Converters Ltd (ASX: CVV) share price is down 5.4% to 26.5 cents today potentially as it operates in a similar consumer credit space to AfterPay. An impending Senate inquiry is set to look at whether tighter regulations need to be put on lenders that exist outside some of the protections already afforded to consumers under existing credit laws.
The Viva Energy Group Ltd (ASX: VEA) share price is down 13% to $12.78 after the petrol refiner and supplier to Shell garages among others, delivered a big profit downgrade today. It now expects underlying EBITDA and NPAT for FY 2018 to be $543 million and $280 million respectively, compared to prior forecasts for $605 million and $324 million respectively. The downgrade was blamed on weaker-than-expected margins and lost production over August in particular.
