Australian Market Swings To Slight Gains In Mid-market

(RTTNews) - The Australian stock market is swinging its slight gains in mid-market trading on Monday after opening in the red, extending the slight gains in the previous session, following the broadly negative cues from Wall Street on Friday. The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 index is moving above the 8,800.00 level, with gains in mining and technology stocks partially offset by weakness in financial stocks.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Index is gaining 5.20 points or 0.06 percent to 8,800.40, after hitting a low of 8,722.90 earlier. The broader All Ordinaries Index is up 9.80 points or 0.11 percent to 8,915.60. Australian stocks closed slightly higher on Friday.

Among the major miners, BHP Group and Fortescue are gaining more than 1 percent each, while Mineral Resources and Rio Tinto are edging up 0.1 to 0.3 percent each.

Oil stocks are mixed. Woodside Energy is gaining more than 1 percent and Santos is adding almost 2 percent, while Origin Energy is losing more than 1 percent and Beach energy is declining more than 2 percent.

Among tech stocks, Afterpay owner Block is losing almost 3 percent, while Xero edging up 0.3 percent, Appen is advancing almost 6 percent and Zip is jumping more than 9 percent. WiseTech Global is flat.

Gold miners are mostly higher. Genesis Minerals and Resolute Mining are adding more than 3 percent each, while Northern Star Resources is advancing almost 2 percent, Evolution Mining is gaining almost 1 percent and Newmont is edging down 0.3 percent.

Among the big four banks, Commonwealth Bank, Westpac, ANZ Banking and National Australia Bank are all losing more than 1 percent each.

In other news, shares in Ingenia Communities Group are jumping more than 6 percent after the company revealed it received an unsolicited takeover proposal from AVID Property Group, backed by international investors.

In the currency market, the Aussie dollar is trading at $0.703 on Monday.