Search and language data services company Appen is acquiring San Francisco-based machine learning technology company Figure Eight for up to $428 million, as it pushes to become a true tech company. The business has created a suite of data annotation tools, which automatically transforms unstructured text, image, audio or video data into data which can be used to train artificial intelligence algorithms.

This investment in automation will allow Appen to take on more projects and complete them at a lower cost. Chief executive Mark Brayan said the acquisition of Figure Eight would let the $2.6 billion company exceed customer expectations in regards to scale, speed and quality. Shares are in a trading halt today, but last traded at $24.37.

Read the full story from Yolanda Redrup at the Financial Review

Gindalbie Metals is proposing it sell wholly owned subsidiary Coda Minerals to its shareholders and then sell itself to Ansteel for 2.6 cents per share. Coda Minerals shares will be distributed pro-rata to shareholders and will still hold Mt Gunson Assets and $10.6 million in cash.

Ansteel is owned by Angang Group Hong Kong and already owned 35.7 per cent of Gindalbie. It will buy all the shares it does not own for 2.6 cents per share. Gindalbie last traded at 1.2 cents. The deal allows Coda to continue without Gindalbie's $231 million worth of bank guarantees to Karara Iron Ore project, which is unlikely to generate profits or dividends.

Gold miner Newcrest Mining said on Monday it had agreed to acquire a majority stake in copper and gold mine in Canada for $806.5 million ($1.12 billion), just a few weeks after its chief executive indicated he had asset purchases on his mind. Newcrest said in a statement it would acquire a 70 per cent joint-venture interest in, and operatorship of, the Red Chris mine and surrounding tenements in British Columbia from Toronto-listed Imperial Metals Corp.

Newcrest shares are up 3.1 per cent in early trading to a two-week high of $25.27.

Red Chris is an operating open-pit mine with mineral resources of 20 million ounces of gold and 13 billion pounds of copper. The property comprised 57,200 acres of land with 77 mineral tenures, Newcrest said. Last month, Newcrest's CEO, Sandeep Biswas, said his company would pursue a potential acquisition only if it were the right value for investors, adding that he would prefer to buy assets rather than whole companies.

Read the full story here

New York hedge fund Manikay Partners has doubled down on its call for the board of accounting software company MYOB to reconsider a takeover offer from vaunted private equity firm KKR, demanding the company provide it with key documents related to the bid. In a letter addressed to MYOB chairman Justin Milne dated March 6, the hedge fund run by former Australian Securities Exchange director Shane Finemore asked the company to provide it with a copy of the draft scheme booklet and independent expert's report that was lodged with the regulator ahead of a court date to approve a shareholder meeting to vote on the deal.

MYOB told the market of Manikay's opposition to the deal last week, but has yet to inform the market about the New York's fund second letter and demand for documents. Manikay last week increased its stake from 10 per cent to 11 per cent.

The company received an initial bid from KKR in October 2018 at $3.70 a share. But following a period of due diligence – which coincided with a brutal correction on global markets, during which some major indices fell by as much as 20 per cent – KKR revised its bid to $3.40 a share on December 20.

Read the full story at the Financial Review here

The S&P/ASX 200 has dropped 21.5 points on opening to be at 6182 currently.

Early big gains are in Northern Star, up 3.8 per cent, Perpetual Ltd, up 3.8 per cent, Nufarm, up 3.8 per cent, and Saracen Minerals, up 3.3 per cent.

Large declines are in Beach Energy, down 2.8 per cent, Pendal Group is down 2.7 per cent, and InvoCare is down 2.6 per cent.

AACo says up to 90 per cent of the cattle Wondoola station died in the Queensland floods, about 29,700 beasts, in its latest update on the impact of the natural disaster. This is the worst affected station. The larger Canobie station, with 36,000 beasts, has a minimum estimated survival rate of between 60 per cent and 70 per cent. While cattle deaths are not as bad as first expected, finding all the surviving animals will take time.

"Overall livestock losses were less than initial expectations in some cases, and the Company has completed an updated evaluation of cattle numbers found to have survived," AACo says. "It is estimated that tens of thousands of kilometres of boundary fences across the Gulf region have been destroyed and it will be some months before these are fully repaired". The damage will cost between $6 million and $8 million to repair.

"The impact on AACo's current herd will not affect the Company's ability to fulfil supply obligations or the rollout of its branded beef strategy, with all animals intended for the company's premium branded beef supply chain already on feed".

Extreme weather added $28.5 million to first half operating costs, and AACo expects the same again in the second half.

Sanjeev Gupta, the man credited with saving the iconic Whyalla steelworks, is targeting a near-$5 billion float of the Australian arm of his sprawling industrial empire in a move he hopes will quash speculation his business may be in trouble. Mr Gupta said an initial public offering of the Australian business would show his companies can "work under governance rules; [being listed] would bring transparency and shows our model is successful".

He added being a listed company would also mean "the discipline of publishing accounts, as well as giving us a currency and market value which will allow us to do other things". The Whyalla steelworks' owner Arrium went into administration in April 2016 owing creditors about $2 billion and remained in limbo for over a year before being sold to Mr Gupta's Gupta Family Group (GFG) Alliance in 2017.

Then South Australian Premier Jay Weatherill said the sale was "a great victory for Whyalla and an extraordinary victory for South Australia". Arrium provided about 3000 jobs in Whyalla, a town of 22,000 people, when it went into administration and its revival was heralded across the political spectrum.

Read the full story from Alan Tovey and Nick Bonyhady here.

As Melbourne gets ready for today's Moomba parade, Key Petroleum, Santos, and Beach Energy have released a deal for gas processing at Santos' Moomba Gas Processing facility.

The non-binding memorandum of understanding covers "proposed terms for connection and transport into the Cooper Basin gas gathering network, and gas processing as the Santos-operated Moomba Gas Processing Facility". It assumes connection from future discoveries and delivery of raw gas delivery into the Cooper Basin gas gathering network.

IG MARKETS SPONSORED POST

SPI futures down 14 points or 0.2% to 6190

AUD +0.5% to 70.45 US cents

On Wall St: Dow -0.1% S&P 500 -0.2% Nasdaq -0.2%

IG MARKETS SPONSORED POST

The Australian sharemarket is set to start the week lower as Wall Street capped a week of losses with a small decline on Friday. The final bastion of global economic growth is showing cracks in it walls. Arguably last week's key-release, US Non-Farm Payrolls disappointed market participants over the weekend, printing well below expectations. It wasn't a clear-cut, poor print. The unemployment rate dropped to 3.8 per cent and wage-growth climbed to 3.4 per cent.

The shocker was the headline number: forecast to reveal a jobs-gain of 180,000, the US economy only added 20,000 last month. It's given rise to concerns that, given how low the unemployment rate is in the US, and that wages are finally picking-up, the long-thriving US labour market has finally reached full capacity for this economic cycle.

The overall bearishness that coloured market-sentiment on Friday, and over the weekend at that, will translate, according to the last traded price of the SPI Futures contract, in a 14-point fall for the ASX200 at this morning's open. This follows a day on Friday of broad-based losses on the ASX, as Aussie shares succumbed to the pressures that had already enervated their global counterparts, to fall nearly 1 per cent for the session. Granted, it was a day of low activity in the market, as volumes traded slightly below average. But the breadth of losses were noteworthy, with 83.5 per cent of stocks lower for the day, and every sector in the market finishing in the red.