Australian Market Significantly Higher

The Australian market is trading significantly higher on Thursday, reversing the losses in the previous session, following the broadly positive cues from Wall Street overnight. The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 is moving well above the 8,300 level to fresh all-time highs, with gains in energy and financial stocks as well as some mining and technology stocks.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Index is gaining 73.60 points or 0.89 percent to 8,358.30, after touching an all-time high of 8,384.50 earlier. The broader All Ordinaries Index is up 70.60 points or 0.83 percent to 8,627.20. Australian stocks ended modestly lower on Wednesday.

Among major miners, Rio Tinto, Mineral Resources and Fortescue Metals are edging up 0.1 to 0.3 percent each, while BHP Group is edging down 0.2 percent.

Oil stocks are mostly higher. Woodside Energy, Beach energy and Santos are edging up 0.1 to 0.4 percent each, while Origin Energy is gaining almost 1 percent.

In the tech space, Afterpay owner Block is gaining almost 3 percent, Xero is adding more than 1 percent and Zip is edging up 0.2 percent, while WiseTech Global is declining almost 4 percent and Appen is losing more than 3 percent.

Among the big four banks, Commonwealth Bank and ANZ Banking are gaining almost 1 percent each, while National Australia Bank is adding more than 1 percent and Westpac is advancing almost 2 percent.

Among gold miners, Evolution Mining and Northern Star Resources are edging down 0.1 to 0.4 percent each, while Resolute Mining is gaining more than 1 percent, Gold Road Resources is edging up 0.5 percent and Newmont is adding almost 1 percent.

In other news, shares in AMP Ltd are surging almost 14 percent after the wealth manager reported strong business growth in the third quarter.

In economic news, the unemployment rate in Australia came in at a seasonally adjusted 4.1 percent in September, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said on Thursday. That was below estimates for 4.2 percent, which would have been unchanged from the August reading.

The Australian economy added 64,100 jobs last month, blowing away forecasts for an increase of 25,200 jobs following the addition of 47,500 jobs in the previous month. The participation rate ticked up to 67.2 percent, beating expectations for 67.1 percent – which would have been unchanged.

In the currency market, the Aussie dollar is trading at $0.669 on Thursday.

On Wall Street, stocks showed a lack of direction early in the session on Wednesday but moved mostly higher over the course of the trading day. With the upward move, the Dow more than offset the loss posted during Tuesday’s session, reaching a new record closing high.

The major averages bounced back and forth across the unchanged line in early trading but climbed more firmly into positive territory as the day progressed. The Dow jumped 337.28 points or 0.8 percent to 43,077.70, the Nasdaq rose 51.49 points or 0.3 percent to 18,367.08 and the S&P 500 climbed 27.21 points or 0.5 percent to 5,842.47.

Meanwhile, the major European markets turned in a mixed performance on the day. While the U.K.’s FTSE 100 Index jumped by 1.0 percent, the German DAX Index slipped by 0.3 percent and the French CAC 40 Index fell by 0.4 percent.

Crude oil prices settled lower on Wednesday, weighed down by concerns about weak demand from China and easing geopolitical worries. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for November ended down $0.19 at $70.39 a barrel.

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