Australian Market Trims Early Gains In Mid-market

(RTTNews) - The Australian stock market is trimming its early gains in mid-market trading on Tuesday, but reversing the losses in the previous session, despite the broadly negative cues from Wall Street overnight. The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 is moving above the 8,400 level, with gains across most sectors led by mining and technology stocks, after US President Donald Trump delayed the imposition of tariffs on major U.S. trading partners.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Index is gaining 36.50 points or 0.44 percent to 8,415.90, after touching a high of 8,446.80 earlier. The broader All Ordinaries Index is up 44.60 points or 0.52 percent to 8,673.00. Australian stocks closed sharply lower on Monday.

Among the major miners, BHP Group is gaining almost 1 percent and Mineral Resources is advancing almost 3 percent, while Rio Tinto and Fortescue Metals are adding almost 2 percent each.

Oil stocks are mixed. Origin Energy, Woodside Energy and Santos are edging down 0.2 to 0.5 percent each, while Beach energy is gaining more than 1 percent.

Among tech stocks, Afterpay owner Block is gaining almost 2 percent, Xero is up more than 1 percent, Zip is advancing almost 6 percent, WiseTech Global is adding 2.5 percent and Appen is surging more than 8 percent after reporting upbeat fourth-quarter results.

Gold miners are mostly higher. Evolution Mining and Newmont are up almost 1 percent each, while Resolute Mining is gaining more than 1 percent, Northern Star resources is edging up 0.5 percent and Gold Road Resources is adding more than 2 percent.

Among the big four banks, Commonwealth Bank, ANZ Banking and National Australia Bank are edging up 0.2 to 0.5 percent each, while Westpac is adding almost 1 percent.

In other news, shares in Predictive Discovery are gaining more than 12 percent after the gold explorer would offload a 10 per cent stake to two mining investors to raise $69.2 million.

Shares in Nufarm are surging almost 4 percent after the chemicals company told investors a previously announced belt-tightening program remains on track.

In the currency market, the Aussie dollar is trading at $0.621 on Tuesday.