Australian Market Slips To Notable Losses In Mid-market

(RTTNews) - The Australian stock market is slipped to notable losses in mid-market trading on Tuesday after opening in the green, following a flat closed in the previous session, despite the broadly positive cues from Wall Street overnight. The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 is falling below the 8,700 level, with weakness in financial and gold miner stocks partially offset by gains in technology stocks.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Index is losing 40.50 points or 0.46 percent to 8,688.10, after touching a high of 8,771.30 earlier. The broader All Ordinaries Index is down 33.70 points or 0.37 percent to 9,001.00. Australian stocks closed nearly flat on Monday.

Among the major miners, BHP Group is gaining more than 1 percent, while Mineral Resources and Rio Tinto are adding almost 1 percent each. Fortescue is losing almost 2 percent. Oil stocks are mixed. Beach energy and Origin Energy are edging down 0.2 to 0.4 percent each, while Woodside Energy and Santos are edging up 0.3 to 0.5 percent each.

Among tech stocks, Afterpay owner Block is advancing more than 4 percent and Xero is adding almost 1 percent, while Appen and Zip are gaining more than 1 percent each. WiseTech Global is down almost 1 percent.

Gold miners are weak. Evolution Mining, Resolute Mining and Newmont are edging down 0.2 to 0.5 percent each, while Genesis Minerals is losing more than 1 percent. Northern Star resources is edging up 0.4 percent.

Among the big four banks, Commonwealth Bank, National Australia Bank, ANZ Banking and Westpac are all losing more than 2 percent each.

In other news, shares in BlueScope Steel are skyrocketing almost 22 percent after confirming it had received a $30 per share takeover offer from a consortium led by SGH Ltd and US-based Steel Dynamics.

In economic news, the service sector in Australia continued to expand in December, albeit at a slower pace, the latest survey from S&P Global revealed on Tuesday with a services PMI score of 51.1. That's down from 52.8 in November, although it remains above the boom-or-bust line of 50 that separates expansion from contraction.

In the currency market, the Aussie dollar is trading at $0.672 on Tuesday.