The Australian sharemarket extended its record high on Wednesday, with investors heartened by encouraging news from London where US and Chinese officials are seeking a trade truce.

The S&P/ASX 200 Index rose 4.9 points, or 0.1 per cent, to close at a new peak of 8592.1 after hitting a fresh intraday high of 8639.1 in morning trading. Seven of the 11 sectors finished higher, led by energy stocks, the big miners and real estate.

Hugh Dive, chief investment officer at Atlas Funds Management, said US money managers were keen to gain exposure to Australian domestic stocks such as Commonwealth Bank, which had helped push the local bourse higher.

‘Lots of green’

“There’s lots of green going through the screen, but it feels like it’s getting harder and harder to rise each day because the ASX is already at such lofty levels,” Dive warned.

“Most people are a bit concerned about the larger end of the market, given the massive price to earnings expansion that we’ve seen in the last month – can it be sustained?”

Investors tracked a rally on Wall Street that pushed the S&P 500 up 0.6 per cent overnight as US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said the second-day negotiations with China had gone well.

After the close of New York trading, both countries agreed to a preliminary plan to ease trade tensions between the world’s two largest economies, with officials agreeing on a framework on how to implement the consensus that had previously been reached in Geneva.

With little catalyst to drive the sharemarket much further during the local session, stocks pared some of their earlier gains as investors await key US inflation data overnight. It’s the last key economic figures before next week’s Federal Reserve meeting.

On the ASX, Woodside Energy led oil stocks higher, rallying 1.9 per cent to $23.5. BHP Group climbed 1.5 per cent to $39.1 as iron ore inched higher in Singapore, while modest gains in ANZ and Westpac also buoyed the market. Commonwealth Bank fell 0.3 per cent to $181.4 after earlier hitting a fresh record of $181.4.

Stocks on the move

In corporate news, Johns Lyng Group rocketed 17.7 per cent to $3 after confirming reports in The Australian Financial Review’s Street Talk column of a non-binding indicative offer proposal from Pacific Equity Partners.

Buy now, pay later giant Zip jumped 15.5 per cent to $2.7 after upgrading its earnings guidance.

New Zealand-based building materials group Fletcher Building jumped 10 per cent to $3.1 after revealing that it had received “ongoing inbound inquiries” from parties interested in its businesses, including the construction division.

Qantas declined 1.3 per cent to $10.5 despite announcing plans to close Jetstar Asia, the Singapore-based budget airline it launched more than two decades ago to capture a lucrative Asian market.

Mortgage insurer Helia rose 0.8 per cent to $5.3 after announcing that chief executive and managing director Pauline Blight-Johnston would stand down after more than five years in the role.

And Monash IVF rallied 11 per cent to 61¢ after plunging 28 per cent on Tuesday when the fertility giant’s management revealed an embryo mix-up at its Melbourne laboratory – the second bungle that the company has been forced to disclose in three months.