July 16 (Reuters) - Australian shares fell on Wednesday, with all sectors slipping after higher U.S. consumer price inflation fuelled concerns that President Donald Trump's tariffs were hurting consumers, while Rio Tinto reported a rise in quarterly iron ore production.
The S&P/ASX 200 index .AXJO fell 0.9% to 8,550.5, as of 0054 GMT. The benchmark ended up 0.7% on Tuesday.
U.S. consumer prices rose at the fastest pace in five months in June, driven by higher costs for certain goods, with economists pointing to broad cost increases as a sign that the Trump administration's escalating import tariffs are filtering through to consumers.
Investors now await U.S. producer price and retail sales data due this week, for further signs of impact from tariffs.
On the local bourse, gold stocks .AXGD dropped more than 2% as bullion prices eased, while market participants awaited tariff updates. GOL/
Sydney-listed shares of gold mining giant Newmont Corporation NEM.N, along with St Barbara SBM.AX, were the top drags on the index, slipping 4.4% and 5.7%, respectively.
The sub-sector weighed on the broader mining index, causing miners .AXMM to fall 1.3%.
The world's largest iron ore producer Rio Tinto RIO.AX fell 0.3%, faring better than the mining index after logging its strongest second quarter output since 2018, with iron ore production from its Pilbara operations at 83.7 million metric tons.
Financial stocks .AXFJ slipped 0.7%, with the country's "big four" banks falling between 0.5% and 0.9%.
Energy stocks .AXEJ were down 0.4%, as oil prices fell after Trump's 50-day deadline for Russia to end the war in Ukraine and avoid sanctions eased concerns about any immediate supply disruption. O/R
Sector major Woodside Energy WDS.AX fell 0.7%, while smaller rival Santos STO.AX traded 0.1% lower.
Locally, investors also look ahead to employment data due on Thursday.
In New Zealand, the benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index .NZ50 rose 0.5% to 12,499.9.
(Reporting by Adwitiya Srivastava in Bengaluru; Editing by Rashmi Aich)
((Adwitiya.Srivastava@thomsonreuters.com))
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