Australian Market Notably Higher

(RTTNews) - The Australian stock market is currently trading notably higher 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 above the 8,300.00 level, with gains across most sectors led by gold miner stock and technology stocks.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Index is gaining 52.20 points or 0.63 percent to 8,335.40, after touching of 8,349.70 earlier. The broader All Ordinaries Index is up 47.00 points or 0.55 percent to 8,598.20. Australian stocks closed significantly lower on Friday.

Among the major miners, BHP Group, Fortescue Metals and Rio Tinto are gaining more than 1 percent, Mineral dived almost 11 percent as the board said it had "full confidence" in managing director Chris Ellison following an investigation by The Australian Financial Review that uncovered how he allegedly evaded tax for years. Oil stocks are mostly higher. Origin Energy is edging up 0.1 percent, Beach energy is gaining more than 2 percent and Santos is adding more than 1 percent. Woodside Energy is up almost 1 percent.

Among tech stocks, Afterpay owner Block is gaining more than 2 percent, Xero is adding more than 1 percent and Zip is edging up 0.4 percent, while Appen is declining almost 4 percent and WiseTech Global is tumbling more than 11 percent after its board initiated a review of allegations against founder and chief executive Richard White by a sexual partner, which ended up in him paying her millions of dollars to settle the matter.

Gold miners are mostly higher. Evolution Mining is gaining 3.5 percent, Resolute Mining is advancing almost 4 percent and Gold Road Resources rising more than 3 percent, while Northern Star Resources and Newmont are adding almost 2 percent each.

Among the big four banks, Commonwealth Bank is gaining almost 1 percent, while National Australia Bank, ANZ Banking and Westpac are edging up 0.1 to 0.5 percent each.

In the currency market, the Aussie dollar is trading at $0.671 on Monday.

On Wall Street, stocks moved mostly higher during trading on Friday after ending the previous session little changed. The tech-heavy Nasdaq led the charge, while the Dow ended the day modestly higher at a new record closing high.

The Nasdaq climbed 115.94 points or 0.6 percent to 18,489.55 and the S&P 500 rose 23.20 points or 0.4 percent to a new record closing high of 5,864.67. The narrower Dow recovered from an initial pullback to end the day up by 36.86 points or 0.1 percent at 43,275.91.

Meanwhile, the major European markets turned in a mixed performance on the day. While the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index fell by 0.3 percent, the French CAC 40 Index and German DAX Index both climbed by 0.4 percent.

Crude oil prices fell on Friday following downward revisions in oil demand forecast from OPEC and the International Energy Agency. West Texas Intermediate crude oil futures for November sank $1.45 or 2.05 percent at $69.22 a barrel. WTI crude futures fell more than 8 percent in the week.