Source : THE AGE NEWS
The Australian sharemarket has advanced in early trade with banks driving higher for the second-straight session, but there were sharp losses for mining stocks.
The S&P/ASX 200 was up 40.1 points, or 0.5 per cent, to 8680.8 in early trade, with nine of 11 industry sectors in positive territory.
Financial stocks continued their recovery after suffering sharp losses in the session following the budget. Commonwealth Bank jumped 2.1 per cent, ANZ and Westpac rose 1.1 per cent and National Australia Bank was 0.8 per cent higher in early trade.
Energy stocks are stronger, with oil prices advancing overnight and in early Asian trade with efforts to end the war in limbo and disruptions that have upended global markets set to linger. Woodside Energy added 1 per cent and Santos climbed 0.4 per cent. Among the local refiners, Ampol rose 1.6 per cent and Viva Energy added 0.2 per cent.
Mining stocks are lower in early trade with BHP losing 1.5 per cent, Rio Tinto 1.9 per cent and Fortescue losing 2.5 per cent. Mineral Resources lost 4.9 per cent after managing director Chris Ellison announced he had sold 1.75 million shares, worth $122.5 million. Gold miners lost ground with the price of the safe haven sliding as investors weighed the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate path after US data this week showed a war-driven surge in inflation. Evolution Mining shed 2.5 per cent and Northern Star 1.5 per cent in early trade.
Tech stocks surged, with Xero clawing back most of Thursday’s heavy losses triggered by its profit result with an 8.6 per cent gain on Friday. WiseTech rose 2.2 per cent, Technology One advanced 2.8 per cent and NEXTDC added 1.8 per cent.
The Australian dollar was weaker at US72.07¢.
Overnight, the S&P 500 climbed 0.8 per cent to set an all-time high for a second-straight day. The Dow Jones rose 370 points, or 0.7 per cent, and finished above the 50,000 level for the first time since the war with Iran began, while the Nasdaq composite added 0.9 per cent to its own record.
Cisco helped lead the market after reporting better profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected. The tech giant’s stock leaped 13.4 per cent for its best day in nearly 15 years, and CEO Chuck Robbins said it saw “very strong, broad-based demand for our products.”
Big Tech behemoths in particular are pouring cash into artificial-intelligence technology, and Cisco gave a forecast for profit in the current quarter that easily topped analysts’ expectations.
Corporate earnings reported so far this season have “reinforced that this is still an AI-led market, but one where the impact is broadening quickly,” according to Gargi Pal Chaudhuri, chief investment and portfolio strategist at BlackRock.
“What started with a handful of companies is now driving earnings growth across semiconductors, infrastructure, and even parts of the industrial economy,” she said.
Meanwhile, China has agreed to buy 200 Boeing jets, US President Donald Trump told Fox News Channel, a number that was far fewer than analysts had expected, and the planemaker’s shares fell.
Details of the deal were not immediately available, including when and which type of jets would be delivered, but the amount was much smaller than the roughly 500-plane package that sources told Reuters was under discussion ahead of a meeting on Thursday between Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping.
Whether US households will keep spending and support the economy is a big question because pressure has been bearing down on them due to high oil prices and inflation created by the Iran war. A report released said that shoppers overall spent less at US retailers last month than economists expected. But the deceleration after factoring out gasoline and automobile sales wasn’t quite as bad as economists thought it would be.
A separate report, meanwhile, said more US workers filed for unemployment benefits last week, which could be an indication of more layoffs. The number, though, remains relatively low compared with history.
With AP, Bloomberg
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