Australian Market Nearly Halves Early Gains In Mid-market

(RTTNews) - The Australian stock market is nearly halving its early gains in mid-market trading on Monday, reversing the losses in the previous session, following the broadly positive cues from Wall Street on Friday. The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 index is moving just above the 8,750.00 level, with gains across most sectors led by gold miners and technology stocks. Iron ore miners were the only weak spot.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Index is gaining 32.30 points or 0.37 percent to 8,750.10, after touching a high of 8,785.90 earlier. The broader All Ordinaries Index is up 37.60 points or 0.42 percent to 9,083.50. Australian stocks closed slightly lower on Friday.

Among the major miners, BHP Group is losing more than 3 percent, Rio Tinto is down more than 1 percent and Fortescue is declining almost 2 percent, while Mineral Resources is gaining almost 2 percent.

Oil stocks are mixed. Beach energy is advancing more than 3 percent and Woodside Energy is gaining almost 1 percent, while Santos and Origin Energy are edging down 0.3 to 0.5 percent each.

Among tech stocks, Afterpay owner Block is adding almost 3 percent, Zip is gaining almost 1 percent, WiseTech Global is edging up 0.2 percent and Appen is advancing almost 4 percent. Xero is flat.

Gold miners are higher. Northern Star Resources is adding more than 3 percent and Newmont is surging almost 6 percent, while Genesis Minerals and Evolution Mining are gaining almost 3 percent each. Resolute Mining is losing almost 1 percent.

Among the big four banks, National Australia Bank, Westpac and ANZ Banking are gaining almost 1 percent each, while Commonwealth Bank is edging up 0.3 percent. In other news, shares in Light & Wonder are skyrocketing almost 16 percent after the gambling product and services firm settled a lawsuit with Aristocrat Leisure, agreeing to pay $190 million.

Shares in PWR Holdings are surging almost 6 percent after the advanced cooling products and solutions provider announced a US$9.1 million follow-on defence and aerospace contract to supply advanced cooling solutions for a US government project.

Shares in Imricor Medical Systems are jumping more than 17 percent after the biotechnology company said US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had granted clearance for its Vision-MR Diagnostic Catheter, which would allow it to be marketed in the US.

In the currency market, the Aussie dollar is trading at $0.670 on Monday.