ASX closes lower on last day of earnings season
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The news: The Australian sharemarket has finished lower on the last day of the August 2025 earnings season as a tech sector rally driven by NextDC was not enough to offset real estate and big bank losses.
The benchmark ASX 200 fell 0.08% to end at 8,973.1 with six out of the 11 sectors finishing in green.
The tech sector (+3.1%) was the best performing after NextDC (17.44%) reported it beat revenue guidance for FY25 and delivered a 6% improvement on underlying EBITDA on Thursday evening.
The real estate sector (-0.9%) was the worst performer after PEXA (-9.3%) delivered a larger than expected full-year net loss after tax. Share price losses were also take by Goodman Group (-1.1%), Scentre (-0.7%) and Stockland (-1.3%).
The finance sector (-0.6%) finished lower as Commonwealth Bank (-1.8%), Westpac (-1%) and NAB (-0.4%) finished lower. ANZ (-0.06%) marginally lower.
Biggest movers:
- Mesoblast (-9.9%) – Posted a larger than expected full-year net loss after tax amid costs associated with commercial team build and product launch as well as fair value remeasurements.
- Lynas Rare Earths (-5.8%) – Successfully completed its $750 million to drive its 2030 strategy, which includes ambitions to expand into the magnet supply chain.
- Austal (+15.1%) – The ship builder reported FY25 statutory profit of $89.7 million, up from $14.9 million in the previous year, boosted by the ramp up of new US defence programs and increased commercial shipbuilding in Australasia.
- Smartgroup Corporation (+12%) – Reported statutory NPAT for FY25 of $38.1 million, 11% higher than the previous corresponding year.
- Harvey Norman (+11.5%) – Recorded a 47% rise in full-year profit after tax to $518 million as the group benefitted from property revaluations and a strong increase in franchisee sales revenue.
- Boss Energy (+7.7%) – Swung to a full-year loss after its first full financial year of production at its Honeymoon and Alta Mesa uranium projects.
Other companies that reported earnings were Bapcor (+1%), Cettire (+5%), Waypoint REIT (+0.4%), Star Entertainment (+5%), and Virgin Australia (-1.2%).
Other news:
- BlueScope Steel (-0.04%) – The Federal Court dismissed appeals by the country's largest steelmaker BlueScope and its former general manager Jason Ellis over previous Federal Court decisions in a civil cartel proceeding brought by the competition regulator.
- Elders (+0.5%) – Announced that Ian Wilton will step down as chair on 31 October and retire as a non-executive director later in the year.
- PointsBet (ended flat) – Japanese entertainment group MIXI has increased its voting power in online bookmaker PointsBet to more than 50%, amid an ongoing takeover battle with fellow shareholder Betr Entertainment (ended flat).
- Pengana International Equities (-2%) - Geoff Wilson has moved to try and remove and replace the listed investment company's directors.
What’s ahead:
- The US Bureau of Economic Analysis will release data on the personal consumption expenditures price index, the Federal Reserves preferred inflation measure, tonight at 10:30pm AEST.
- The China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing will release data on the purchasing manager’s index on Sunday at 11:30am AEST.
