Australian Market Swings To Significant Gains In Mid-market

(RTTNews) - The Australian stock market is swinging to significant gains in mid-market trading on Tuesday, snapping the three-session losing streak, following the mixed cues from Wall Street overnight. The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 is moving above the 8,500 level, with gains in gold miners, financial and technology stocks partially offset by weakness in iron ore miners and energy stocks.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Index is gaining 68.00 points or 0.80 percent to 8,529.00, after hitting a low of 8,410.60 and a high of 8,549.00 earlier. The broader All Ordinaries Index is up 71.10 points or 0.83 percent to 8,729.60. Australian stocks closed notably lower on Monday.

Among the major miners, BHP Group and Rio Tinto are edging up 0.1 to 0.4 percent each, while Mineral Resources is slipping more than 3 percent and Fortescue is down almost 1 percent.

Oil stocks are mostly lower. Woodside Energy, Origin Energy and Beach energy are edging down 0.2 to 0.4 percent each, while Santos is losing more than 1 percent.

Among tech stocks, Afterpay owner Block is surging almost 5 percent, WiseTech Global is advancing more than 5 percent, Xero is jumping almost 8 percent, Appen is gaining more than 4 percent and Zip is rising more than 6 percent.

Gold miners are higher. Evolution Mining is adding almost 2 percent, Genesis Minerals is surging almost 5 percent, Resolute Mining is jumping almost 9 percent, Newmont is gaining almost 3 percent and Northern Star resources is advancing more than 4 percent.

Among the big four banks, Commonwealth Bank and ANZ Banking are adding almost 1 percent each, while National Australia Bank is up more than 1 percent and Westpac is gaining almost 2 percent.

In economic news, the Reserve Bank of Australia will release the minutes from its March 17 monetary policy meeting. At the meeting, the RBA lifted its benchmark rate for the second straight time as the conflict in the Middle East poses material risk to inflation.

The bank decided to hike the cash rate target by 25 basis points to 4.10 percent, with five members voting to raise the rate and four seeking to hold it at 3.85 percent.

In the currency market, the Aussie dollar is trading at $0.684 on Tuesday.