Stocks remain mired in red at noon

The big miners continue to drag on the local bourse at noon, as all major sectors remain in the red.

The Australian Stock Market suffered huge losses today. Images of the ASX in Bridge St, Sydney. Picture: Toby Zerna

The Australian sharemarket remains in the red after falling one per cent in early trade, continuing a weak run that has seen the local bourse fail to keep pace with offshore markets.
At 12.00pm (AEST), the benchmark S&P/ASX 200 index was down 47.6 points, or 0.88 per cent, at 5,376.6 points and the broader All Ordinaries index was down 44.7 points, or 0.81 per cent, at 5,476.4.

Major banks, mining and energy shares led the decline, as iron ore prices slipped to their lowest points in six weeks.

IG chief market strategist Chris Weston said the local market had the potential to move higher in coming days given low volatility, but for now was mired in a period of underperformance.

“The trend in many developed market equities is higher and that needs to respected, especially with implied volatility just so low,” he said.

“The ASX 200 is the outlier and starting to underperform, although the index has found buying into 5,400.

“If we think that the ASX 200 is a global yield play, then we could see support start to emerge in this low volatility environment.”

Meanwhile, as of 1pm (AEST) the Australian dollar had risen to US76.82c from US76.7c after a quiet offshore session.

Withh AAP