ASX falls as mining giants decline; Bitcoin hits record

Welcome to your five-minute recap of the trading day.

The numbers

The Australian sharemarket traded lower again on Tuesday, weighed down by energy and mining stocks, which fell sharply for a second day after China’s new economic package failed to wow investors.

The S&P/ASX 200 closed 10.6 points, or 0.1 per cent, lower at 8,255.6 points, despite solid performances by utilities, consumer and tech stocks, which helped limit the broader market decline. The ASX lost 0.4 per cent on Monday.

Wall Street has kicked off the week with more gains.Credit: Bloomberg

The lifters

Afterpay owner Square was the best performer of the day, finishing 10.7 per cent higher to $126.40. Pilbara Minerals finished 5.7 per cent higher and Megaport rose 5.3 per cent.

Bolstering the local bourse, technology stocks were the best performers with a sector gain of 1.4 per cent. WiseTech rose 1.8 per cent, as did enterprise software maker Technology One. Xero and family-member tracking app Life 360 rose 1 per cent, respectively.

The laggards

Uranium miner Paladin Energy tanked by 28.9 per cent after cutting its production forecasts. Gold miners also fell, following a 2.4 per cent drop in the spot gold price; Bellevue Gold fell 6.7 per cent, Northern Star Resources slumped 2.7 per cent and Evolution Mining lost 3.5 per cent.

But it was especially the mining heavyweights that sent the Australian bourse lower after iron ore prices fell 1.7 per cent overnight. BHP, the world’s largest miner, lost 1.8 per cent, with Rio Tinto not far behind (down 1.6 per cent). Fortescue Metals, which dipped earlier, wound up 0.1 per cent higher.

The lowdown

IG market analyst Tony Sycamore said the ASX’s decline for the second day in a row was a partial reversal of last week’s post-US election gains.

“The primary driver behind this week’s pullback is the underwhelming Chinese stimulus package announced on Friday, compounded by lacklustre Chinese inflation data over the weekend. These developments have fuelled concerns that Chinese authorities are not responding swiftly enough to tackle sluggish demand and deflation risks.”

China unveiled a 10 trillion yuan ($2.1 trillion) debt package on Friday to ease local government financing strains and stabilise flagging economic growth, but officials refrained from announcing direct economic stimulus, sending a shudder across global markets and raising fears for Chinese demand for metals such as iron ore. China is Australia’s biggest export market.

Financial stocks were mixed, with CBA – the biggest stock on the Australian sharemarket – finishing 0.3 per cent higher after seesawing throughout the day. Westpac also rose 0.3 per cent, while ANZ gained 1.3 per cent and Macquarie added 1 per cent. National Australia Bank, however, shed 3 per cent as its stock went ex-dividend, meaning it traded without the right to its latest 85¢-a-share payout for the first time.

Fund manager Platinum Asset Management shed 0.9 per cent after copping a 72.9 per cent shareholder vote against its remuneration report, as the company attempts a turnaround after suffering more money outflows last financial year. The backlash on executive pay was Platinum’s second “strike”, or a vote of 25 per cent or more against its remuneration report.

In some brighter news, new business and consumer confidence indexes from the Westpac-Melbourne Institute and NAB showed improvement as Australians became less fazed about the prospect of another rate hike.

The local losses came even after US stocks rose overnight, pushed higher by the companies deemed to be the biggest winners from Donald Trump’s re-election as president.

On Wall Street, the S&P 500 edged up by 0.1 per cent, coming off its best week of the year following Trump’s victory and a cut to interest rates by the Federal Reserve to bolster the economy. The Dow Jones rose 304 points, or 0.7 per cent, while the Nasdaq composite gained 0.1 per cent.

Tesla was the strongest force pushing upward on the S&P 500 after rising 9.1 per cent. Its leader, Elon Musk, has become a close ally of Trump’s, and its stock jumped nearly 15 per cent the day after the election and has kept rising.

Several pieces of what’s known as the “Trump trade” also helped drive the market, as investors try to identify which companies will be winners under a second Trump term. JPMorgan Chase rose 1 per cent, and financial stocks again helped lead the market on expectations for stronger economic growth, less regulation from Washington and an increase in mergers and acquisitions.

Stocks of companies more focused on the US economy were also rising more than the rest of the market, including a 1.5 per cent rally for the smaller stocks in the Russell 2000 index because they’re seen as benefiting more from Trump’s America First policies than big multinational companies.

They helped offset a drop of 1.6 per cent for Nvidia, which was the heaviest weight on the market.

Such Big Tech stocks have rocketed higher on excitement about artificial-intelligence technology, and they had been gaining almost regardless of what the economy was doing. Now, though, critics say their prices look too expensive, and investors are finding more interesting buys among companies that could benefit more from Trump’s second term.

A drop for Nvidia packs a particularly heavy punch because its massive value of nearly $US3.6 trillion ($5.2 trillion) makes it one of the most influential stocks on the S&P 500 and other indexes.

Bitcoin has surged to a record high. Credit: Getty

Some of the sharpest swings were in the crypto market, where Bitcoin rose above $US87,000 for the first time. Trump has embraced cryptocurrencies generally and pledged to make his country the crypto capital of the world. Bitcoin was up 9.5 per cent to $US88,683.03 as of 4.35pm AEDT after hitting an earlier high of $US89,560.95.

Another Trump trade has been a rise in Treasury yields, as traders anticipate potentially higher economic growth, US government debt and inflation because of Trump’s policies. But trading in the US bond market was closed on Monday in observance of Veterans Day.

Tweet of the day

Quote of the day

“Even though Cbus was aware of inordinate delays affecting thousands of members and claimants, it failed to take prompt and effective action to prevent and/or reduce such losses.”

That’s from court documents filed by corporate watchdog ASIC, which is suing embattled construction industry superannuation fund Cbus Super for not processing death and disability insurance claims in a timely manner, costing members a total of $20 million.

You may have missed

Australia is packed with industries dominated by a small number of large companies, be it in aviation, telecommunications, supermarkets or banks. All say competition is a good thing.

Consumers view such comments with scepticism – and how justified that scepticism is was highlighted on Tuesday by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s report into airfares, says business columnist Elizabeth Knight.

It turns out airfares between Australia’s cities have increased by up to 95 per cent since July, when Australia’s third airline, the embattled Rex, collapsed.

Staff reporters with AP

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