Australian Market Sharply Extends Early Gains In Mid-market

(RTTNews) - The Australian stock market is extending its early gains in mid-market trading on Tuesday, adding to the gains in the previous session, following the mixed cues from Wall Street overnight. The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 index is moving above the 9,150 level, with gains in gold miners, financial and technology stocks.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Index is gaining 59.50 points or 0.65 percent to 9,162.60, after touching a high of 9,179.90 earlier. The broader All Ordinaries Index is up 52.90 points or 0.56 percent to 9,368.60. Australian stocks closed notably higher on Monday.

Among the major miners, Rio Tinto is adding more than 1 percent and BHP Group is gaining almost 1 percent, while Mineral Resources is losing more than 1 percent and Fortescue is edging down 0.5 percent.

Oil stocks are mixed. Beach energy is losing almost 1 percent and Santos is edging down 0.2 percent, while Origin Energy is adding more than 1 percent. Woodside Energy is flat.

Among tech stocks, Afterpay owner Block is edging up 0.3 percent, Zip is gaining almost 4 percent, Xero is adding almost 2 percent, Appen is up almost 3 percent and WiseTech Global is advancing more than 3 percent.

Gold miners are mostly higher. Evolution Mining and Resolute Mining are gaining more than 1 percent each, while Newmont is adding almost 1 percent and Genesis Minerals is edging up 0.4 percent. Northern Star Resources is edging down 0.4 percent.

Among the big four banks, ANZ Banking, Westpac and National Australia Bank are adding almost 1 percent each, while Commonwealth Bank is edging up 0.3 percent.

In other news, shares in ARB Corporation are soaring more than 17 percent as it kept its final dividend steady at 35 cents a share despite net profit and sales revenue falling in the financial year.

In economic news, the Reserve Bank of Australia will on Tuesday release the minutes from its August 11 monetary policy meeting. At the meeting, the RBA kept its benchmark lending rate steady at 4.35 percent following 25 basis point hikes in February, March and May.

The board said it remains focused on ensuring that high inflation does not become embedded, although CPI is not expected to return to around the midpoint of the target range until late 2027

In the currency market, the Aussie dollar is trading at $0.715 on Tuesday.