Australian shares closed flat after gains in the tech and real sectors were offset by losses in industrials, amid growing hopes that the US will reach concrete deals with its top trading partners.
The S&P/ASX 200 Index fell 1.2 points, or 0.01 per cent, to 8541.1 on Tuesday after making gains in the morning, with seven out of the 11 sectors in the red.
The local tech sector took a strong lead from Wall Street, where the Nasdaq closed at a record high. Xero rose by 1.2 per cent to $182.03 and Life360 climbed 4.4 per cent to $33.59, while DroneShield jumped 12.3 per cent to $2.56, Appen gained 3.6 per cent to $1.16, and Zip rose 4.6 per cent $3.21. Wisetech, however, dropped 1 per cent to $107.99.
Retail stocks also climbed, with Treasury Wine up 0.9 per cent to $7.88, Endeavour Group up 1.3 per cent to $4.06, and Harvey Norman all up 1.5 per cent to $5.35.
“Retail sales momentum is building thanks to rising incomes and abating headwinds,” said Morningstar director of equity research Johannes Faul.
“We forecast hardware and takeaway sales growth to outperform as the construction market and consumer sentiment improve.”
The real estate sector was bid higher as investors took advantage of last week’s dip, with Dexus and Vicinity Centres both rising by more than 1.5 per cent, while GPT rose by 2.1 per cent to $4.94, Stockland gained 1.7 per cent to $5.45, and Scentre Group jumped 2.8 per cent to $3.66.
Profit-taking in index heavyweight Commonwealth Bank, which fell back 1.2 per cent to $182.58, resulted in gains for the other big banks, with ANZ up 2.5 per cent to $29.89, National Australia Bank up 0.9 per cent to $39.70, and Westpac also edging higher.
Oil held a decline to trade near the lowest level since early June, while gold rose on optimism that the Federal Reserve will resume rate cuts later this year. Iron ore futures in Singapore fell 1 per cent to $US93.10 a tonne, which pushed Rio Tinto shares down 0.9 per cent to $106.12 and BHP down 0.5 per cent to $36.57.
The Australian dollar was trading at around US65.75¢ as of 4pm on Tuesday after earlier hitting US65.84¢ – its highest level since November.
SGH dropped 2.9 per cent to $52.52, following news that Vik Bansal will step down as chief executive of Boral and transition to a role as non-executive director of SGH.
Insignia Financial jumped 5.2 per cent to $3.82 after CC Capital said it would continue to “actively work towards making a binding bid for the company” and would finalise financing and investment committee approvals in the next two weeks.
Biotech company Tetratherix rose another 12.3 per cent to $3.39 on Tuesday after climbing 4.9 per cent on its debut on Monday to close at $3.02, in what was the latest of a handful of initial public offerings this month.
David Di Pilla’s HMC Capital plunged 17.3 per cent to $4.22 after announcing that its energy transition head, Angela Karl, has stepped down. It also announced a one-month delay to its acquisition of French renewable energy company Neoen’s assets in Victoria.
Mesoblast shares jumped 11.2 per cent to $1.84 after the Australian biopharmaceutical company announced progress had been made on one of its treatments with the United States Food and Drug Administration.
And Medibank Private rose 2 per cent to $5.15 after Morgan Stanley upgraded its rating on the stock to overweight, at one point reaching an intraday record of $5.31.
Disclaimer: Investing carries risk. This is not financial advice. The above content should not be regarded as an offer, recommendation, or solicitation on acquiring or disposing of any financial products, any associated discussions, comments, or posts by author or other users should not be considered as such either. It is solely for general information purpose only, which does not consider your own investment objectives, financial situations or needs. TTM assumes no responsibility or warranty for the accuracy and completeness of the information, investors should do their own research and may seek professional advice before investing.