ASX starts week higher as gold rallies
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The news: The Australian sharemarket ended the day higher with gold miners leading gains as prices for the commodity reached a fresh record high.
The numbers: The benchmark ASX 200 increased 0.63% to 7,863.7, with seven out of 11 sectors finishing in green.
The best-performing sector was energy, up 2.23%, followed by materials (1.93%) and IT ($1.05%). Big oil majors Woodside (2.04%) and Santos (2.19%) both ended higher.
Gold miners made up more than half of the top 10 performing stocks, including Bellevue Gold (7.98%), Evolution Mining (5.7%), Gold Road Resources (6.03%), Regis Resources (5.67%) and Perseus Mining (4.62%) and Ramelius Resources (4.46%). Gold prices have lifted in recent days due to increased optimism of a US interest rate cut.
The best-performing ASX 200 stock was Star Entertainment, up 17.22%, after it confirmed it had received a takeover interest from a consortium that included Hard Rock Hotels & Resorts (Pacific).
New Hope gained 5.77% after it reported a sharp lift in quarterly sales and production, while Telix increased 3.51% following its announcement of its plans for a US IPO.
Elders increased 1.58% despite reporting a plummet in its first-half profit.
Across the wider ASX, Nuix surged 25.21% after announcing that positive trading and deal wins would lead to it exceeding full-year statutory revenue by around 10%.
The worst performing sector was healthcare, down 0.86%, followed by consumer staples (-0.57%) and AREITs (-0.39%). CSL (-0.53%), Cochlear (-2.84%) and Resmed (-1.04%) all fell.
Core Lithium fell 6.06% after announcing that it had appointed ex-MinRes exec Paul Brown as its new CEO.
The Australian dollar is higher, buying 66.95 US cents.
The context: Tuesday will see the Reserve Bank of Australia release minutes from its last monetary policy meeting, while the Australian Bureau of Statistics will publish the latest monthly employee earnings indicator.
