Australian Market Extends Early Strong Losses In Mid-market

(RTTNews) - The Australian stock market is extending its early strong losses in mid-market moves on Friday, adding to the losses in the previous session, following the broadly negative cues from Wall Street overnight. The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 is falling well below the 8,750 level, with weakness across all segments led by technology and mining stocks.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Index is losing 169.20 points or 1.90 percent to 8,720.00, after hitting a low of 8,714.10 earlier. The broader All Ordinaries Index is down 187.20 points or 2.05 percent to 8,967.70. Australian stocks closed notably lower on Thursday.

Among major miners, Rio Tinto is edging down 0.4 percent, BHP Group is declining almost 3 percent, Fortescue is losing almost 1 percent and Mineral Resources is tumbling more than 4 percent.

Oil stocks are weak. Santos is slipping more than 1 percent, Woodside Energy is down almost 2 percent, Origin Energy is losing almost 1 percent and Beach energy is declining almost 4 percent. Among tech stocks, Afterpay-owner Block is declining almost 7 percent, WiseTech Global is slipping almost 5 percent, Zip is sliding almost 6 percent, Xero is losing more than 2 percent and Appen is tumbling almost 9 percent.

Among the big four banks, ANZ Banking and National Australia Bank are losing more than 1 percent each, while Commonwealth Bank and Westpac are edging down 0.1 percent each. Gold miners are weak. Evolution Mining and Northern Star Resources are losing more than 2 percent each, while Newmont and Genesis Minerals are tumbling more than 6 percent each. Resolute Mining is down almost 2 percent.

In other news, shares in REA Group are tumbling more than 10 percent after its first-half financial results missed analysts' expectations.

Shares in Web Travel Group are plummeting almost 29 percent after the hotel room aggregator announced that the Special Delegation of the Balearic Islands of the Spanish Tax Agency has commenced an audit of its Spanish subsidiary.

In the currency market, the Aussie dollar is trading at $0.694 on Friday.