The Australian sharemarket inverted the morning session’s movement to conclude a tumultuous trading day on a low note, breaking a four-day streak of gains. Losses in Materials and Health Care overpowered gains in tech and telco stocks, as the contest between the sectors drove the market up and down throughout the day.
Iron miners applied the heaviest downward pressure on the market today, contradicting an increase in the steel-making component’s prices over night. The contrastive Dalian outlook for iron ore prices indicated further falls, as mining giants BHP
(ASX:BHP) and Rio Tinto shed 2.4 and 2.2 per cent respectively.
Health Care also sagged the second lowest on the market, as CSL
(ASX:CSL) dipped 1.1 per cent to $288.86.
At the closing bell, the ASX200 closed 0.3 per cent lower or 23 points down at 7093
FuturesThe Dow Jones futures are pointing to a rise of 50.00 points.
The S&P 500 futures are pointing to a rise of 8.75 points.
The Nasdaq futures are pointing to a rise of 36.25 points.
The SPI futures are pointing to a rise of 29 points when the market next opens.
Best and worst performersThe best-performing sector was Information Technology, up 1.11 per cent. The worst-performing sector was Materials, down 1.15 per cent.
The best-performing stock was ALS
(ASX:ALQ) adding 12.84 per cent to $12.30, followed by Domain Holdings
(ASX:DHG) and Nextdc
(ASX:NXT).
The worst-performing stock was Kogan
(ASX:KGN) dropping 5.73 per cent to $10.03, followed by OZ Minerals
(ASX:OZL) and Redbubble
(ASX:RBL)Asian marketsJapan's Nikkei has gained 0.31%.
Hong Kong's Hang Seng has gained 0.68%
China's Shanghai Composite has gained 0.32%
Commodities and the dollarGold is trading at US$1903.38 an ounce.
Iron ore is 0.2 per cent higher at US$192.87 a tonne.
Iron ore futures are pointing to a rise of 5.2 per cent.
Light crude is trading $0.08 lower at US$63.64 a barrel.
One Australian dollar is buying 77.82 US cents.
