Australian Market Significantly Lower

The Australian stock market is trading significantly lower on Tuesday, giving up the gains in the previous session, with the benchmark S&P/ASX 200 falling below the 7,200 mark, following the lack of cues from Wall Street overnight, with weakness in materials and technology stocks partially offset by gains in gold miners and energy stocks as rising geopolitical tension between Russia and Ukraine is weighing on market sentiment.

Meanwhile, concerns over the domestic COVID-19 cases have softened as the daily new cases are on a steady decline, despite some spikes intermittently.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Index is losing 68.50 points or 0.95 percent to 7,165.10, after hitting a low of 7,133.50 earlier. The broader All Ordinaries Index is down 77.40 points or 1.03 percent to 7,429.60. Australian stocks closed modestly higher on Monday.

Among the major miners, Rio Tinto, BHP Group and Fortescue Metals are losing almost 1 percent each, while Mineral Resources is declining more than 1 percent and OZ Minerals is slipping more than 4 percent.

Oil stocks are higher. Woodside Petroleum and Beach energy are advancing more than 2 percent each, while Santos is adding almost 2 percent and Origin Energy is gaining almost 1 percent.

Among the big four banks, Westpac and ANZ Banking are losing almost 1 percent each, while Commonwealth Bank and National Australia Bank are declining almost 2 percent each.

Among tech stocks, Zip is plunging more than 7 percent, Xero is losing almost 4 percent, Block sliding more than 6 percent, Appen is declining more than 2 percent and WiseTech Global is slipping more than 5 percent.

Gold miners are mostly higher. Evolution Mining is gaining more than 2 percent, Northern Star Resources is advancing more than 4 percent, Gold Road Resources is up more than 1 percent and Newcrest Mining is adding almost 2 percent, while Resolute Mining is losing almost 3 percent.

In other news, shares in Coles are gaining almost 4 percent after the supermarket giant posted a better-than-expected first-half profit, with sales for the period rising slightly. Coles also declared an interim dividend.

Shares in Cochlear are surging more than 8 percent after the medtech declared an higher interim dividend, while reporting a 12 percent increase in constant currency revenues, but statutory net profit dropped 30 percent. It confirmed its full-year underlying profit guidance.

In the currency market, the Aussie dollar is trading at $0.719 on Tuesday.

On Wall Street, the markets were off on Monday for the President’s Day holiday and will return to action on Tuesday.

The major European markets were mixed in cautious trade on the day The German DAX was up 0.1 percent and the U.K.’s FTSE 100 edged up 0.2 percent, while France’s CAC 40 index slipped 0.3 percent.

Crude oil prices were subdued on Monday as global leaders push for a diplomatic solution to Russia-Ukraine crisis. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for March ended lower by 0.3 percent at $89.98 a barrel.

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