National Day or election rally around the corner?

IT ISN'T very often that stocks perform as amazingly as CEFC International or Qingmei, posting massive percentage gains in high volume for several days in a row. Such superior outperformance gets the juices flowing, the adrenalin pumping and undoubtedly, contra players jumping in. The last time the local market enjoyed a meaningful, comparable penny boom was in early 2014 - almost 18 months ago.

So most players will be hoping that the penny game of the past week can continue at least a little longer, even if many stocks at the centre of the game have no fundamentals or have not made any concrete announcements to justify their gains.

If interest flags - or, if you prefer, if the house traders and syndicates who provided the early impetus start to withdraw - then we'd expect the market to revert to its familiar "steady state" of low volatility and low volume, both of which would then equate to low excitement.