ASX ends higher with gains from real estate
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The news: The Australian sharemarket has finished higher with real estate and healthcare leading gains.
The numbers: The benchmark ASX200 ended up 0.3% to 7,848.5, with eight out of 11 sectors finishing in green.
The best performing sector was AREITs (1.18%) followed by healthcare (1.03%), followed by materials (0.85%). Large real estate stocks enjoyed gains including Goodman Group (1.6), Scentre Group (0.76%) and Stockland (1.28%).
Meanwhile, Centuria Capital gained 0.28% after announcing that it had acquired an additional stake in real estate finance business Centura Bass Credit as it bets on growth in the non-bank lending segment.
Large iron ore stocks extended their rally from Tuesday with BHP up 0.64%, Fortescue up 1.58% and Rio Tinto up 1.93%. Rio Tinto along with the Western Australian government also announced a $21.6 million commitment into two separate startup programmes focusing on nature tech and mining decarbonisation tech, run by Founders Factors.
The worst performing sector was IT, down 1.2%, followed by financials (-0.39%) and energy (-0.37%). Large tech firm Wisetech was down 3.28% while most of the big four also recorded losses with CBA down 0.89%, NAB down 0.06% and ANZ down 0.1%.
Today, NAB announced an overhaul of its executive leadership team, days after new CEO Andrew Irvine took over the bag.
Elsewhere, Perseus Mining finished down 3% after the announcement of its takeover bid for Orecorp being accepted.
The Australian dollar is lower buying US66.24 cents.
The Context: All eyes will be on US CPI figures that will be released tonight at 10.30pm AEDT, as it will aid the US Federal Reserve on its next monetary policy decision at the end of the month.
Thursday will see the Australian Bureau of Statistics release the latest monthly business turnover and weekly payroll job figures while Santos will hold its annual general meeting.
Offshore on Thursday will see the European Central Bank make its latest monetary policy decision while the latest US producer price index (PPI) figures will be released along with China’s CPI and PPI figures.
