ASX finishes lower as consumer staples drag
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The news: The Australian sharemarket has ended the week lower as consumer staples and discretionary dragged.
The numbers: The benchmark ASX200 finished 0.33% down to 7,788.1, with eight out of 11 sectors ending in red.
The worst performing sector was consumer staples, down 0.93%, followed by consumer discretionary (-0.75%) and AREITs (-0.68%). Large supermarkets Woolworths (-0.89%) and Coles (-1.29%) finished lower as did Treasury Wine Estates (-1.12%) and Endeavour Group (0.57%).
On the consumer discretionary side, Wesfarmers (-0.64%) and Aristocrat Leisure (-0.19%) fell as did Domino’s (-6.95%) after it failed to impress shareholders after its strategy day.
Cettire also ended lower, down 5.76%, despite posting strong quarterly sales and announcing its imminent launch into China.
The worst performing stock across the ASX 200 was The Star Entertainment, down 7.8%, after reporting a slide in revenue during the March quarter.
Elsewhere, Atlas Arteria finished down 0.19% after it announced the appointment of a senior executive to boost its North America operations and that its Chicago Skyway business was raising USD205 million ($313 million) by way of debt in the US private placement market.
The best performing sector was utilities, up 1.23%, followed by IT (0.45%) and healthcare (0.03%). Origin Energy enjoyed gains of 2.31% after announcing it had agreed to buy one of the largest wind farms in NSW.
While in a trading halt, Genex announced it had entered into a binding transaction to allow Japan’s J-Power to acquire the company. Its shares rose 7% after the lift of the trading halt.
Meanwhile, Boral (2.32%) and Seven Group Holdings (0.38%) shares gained after announcing that Boral’s bid response committee had agreed to back Seven’s buyout bid after a tweak in its offer.
The context: Next week will see the Australian Bureau of Statistics release the latest labour force figures. Offshore, US figures for retail sales and unemployment will be released along with the UK’s latest CPI figures.
