Why Fiducian Group, Northern Star, Paradigm, and Santos shares are charging higher

Apr 18,2024
Why Fiducian Group, Northern Star, Paradigm, and Santos shares are charging higher

The S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) is having another day to forget on Friday. In afternoon trade, the benchmark index is down 1.45% to 7,532.3 points.

Four ASX shares that are not letting that hold them back today and are avoiding the market selloff are listed below. Here's why they are rising:

The Fiducian Group share price is up 6% to $8.04. This follows the release of an update from the financial services company. The company revealed that net inflows to the core Fiducian platform for the quarter ending 31 March 2024 were $53 million. This brings its year to date net inflows to $139 million. This means that the company's funds under management, administration and advice were $13.7 billion at the end of March. This is up 11.4% year on year from $12.3 billion.

The Northern Star share price is up 4% to $15.90. Investors have been buying Northern Star and other gold miners today after investors rotated out of risk assets and into risk off/safe haven assets. This has been driven by reports claiming that Israel has retaliated to the recent Iranian attacks with strikes of its own. Demand has been so strong for safe haven assets that the S&P/ASX All Ordinaries Gold index is up almost 3% this afternoon.

The Paradigm Biopharmaceuticals share price is up 3.5% to 29.5 cents. This morning, this biopharmaceuticals company announced the submission of key documents to the US Food and Drug Agency (FDA) for review and agreement on the progression of the phase 3 clinical program in osteoarthritis. Paradigm's managing director, Paul Rennie, commented: "This is important progress for Paradigm as we deliver a significant amount of new data to the US FDA for review to progress to the next stage of the phase 3 OA program."

The Santos share price is up 3% to $7.93. This has also been driven by news that Israel has retaliated and attacked Iranian sites with missiles. In response to the news, oil prices have jumped almost 4% amid concerns that this could disrupt oil supply in the region. According to CNBC, at the time of writing, the WTI crude oil price is up 4% to US$86.06 a barrel and the Brent crude oil price is up 3.9% to US$90.50 a barrel. The S&P/ASX 200 Energy index is up 0.8% in afternoon trade.