Australian Market Significantly Lower

(RTTNews) - The Australian stock market is significantly lower on Friday, snapping a four-session winning streak, with the benchmark S&P/ASX 200 falling to nearly the 6,800 level, following the mostly negative cues from Wall Street overnight, with weakness across most sectors, led by materials and technology stocks, which mirrored their peers on Nasdaq amid disappointing quarterly reports from big technology companies.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Index is losing 40.90 points or 0.60 percent to 6,804.20, after hitting a low of 6,799.60 earlier. The broader All Ordinaries Index is down 48.20 points or 0.68 percent to 6,994.10. Australian markets ended modestly higher on Thursday.

Among major miners, BHP Group and Rio Tinto are slipping more than 4 percent each, while OZ Minerals is down more than 1 percent, Mineral Resources is losing almost 4 percent and Fortescue Metals is plunging more than 7 percent.

Oil stocks are mixed. Origin Energy is losing more than 1 percent and Beach energy is down almost 1 percent, while Woodside Energy is gaining more than 1 percent and Santos is edging up 0.4 percent.

Among tech stocks, Appen is losing more than 2 percent, Zip is down almost 2 percent and Xero is slipping almost 4 percent, while Afterpay owner Block and WiseTech Global are declining more than 1 percent each. Among the big four banks, National Australia Bank, Westpac and ANZ Banking are edging up 0.2 to 0.4 percent each, while Commonwealth Bank is gaining almost 1 percent.

Gold miners are weak. Newcrest Mining is losing more than 2 percent, Evolution Mining is down almost 1 percent, Resolute Mining is slipping almost 5 percent, Gold Road Resources is declining more than 2 percent and Northern Star Resources is dipping almost 1 percent.

In the currency market, the Aussie dollar is trading at $0.645 on Friday.

On Wall Street, stocks spent much of Wednesday's session on opposite sides of the unchanged line and turned in another mixed performance during trading on Thursday. While the Dow closed higher for the fifth straight session, reaching its best closing level in well over a month, the Nasdaq extended the sharp pullback seen in the previous session.

The Dow climbed 194.17 points or 0.6 percent to 32,033.28, the Nasdaq tumbled 178.32 points or 1.6 percent to 10,792.67 and the S&P 500 fell 23.30 points or 0.6 percent to 3,807.30.

The major European markets also finished the day mixed. While the French CAC 40 Index fell by 0.5 percent, the German DAX Index inched up by 0.1 percent and the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index rose by 0.3 percent.

Crude oil prices climbed higher on Thursday, extending gains from the previous session amid optimism about demand growth. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for December were up $1.17 or 1.3 percent at $89.08 a barrel.