The Australian stock market is declining on Wednesday despite the overnight gains on Wall Street with investors turning cautious as they awaited the outcome of the U.S. presidential election and also digested a raft of local economic data.
The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Index is losing 67.90 points or 1.12 percent to 5,998.50, after touching a high of 6078.30 earlier. The broader All Ordinaries Index is down 67.50 points or 1.08 percent to 6,195.30. Australian stocks closed notably higher on Tuesday.
Among the major miners, Fortescue Metals is losing more than 5 percent, Rio Tinto is lower by almost 2 percent, and BHP Group is declining more than 1 percent.
Gold miner Evolution Mining is declining more than 1 percent and peer Newcrest Mining is down almost 1 percent.
In the banking space, Commonwealth Bank, Westpac and ANZ Banking are lower in a range of 1.3 percent to 2.0 percent, while National Australia Bank is down almost 1 percent.
Oil stocks are also mostly lower even as crude oil prices rose overnight. Woodside Petroleum is losing 0.6 percent and Santos is lower by 0.4 percent, while Oil Search is advancing more than 1 percent.
Woolworths said its food sales rose 12.9 percent in the first quarter, while sales for the entire group increased by more than 12 percent. However, the supermarket giant's shares are declining almost 1 percent.
On the economic front, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said that the total value of retail sales in Australia dropped a seasonally adjusted 1.1 percent on month in September, standing at A$29.157 billion. That beat forecasts for a decline of 1.5 percent following the 4.0 percent drop in August.
The Australian Industry Group said that the construction sector in Australia moved into expansion territory in October, with a seasonally adjusted Performance of Construction score of 52.7. That's up from 45.2 and it moves above the boom-or-bust line of 50 that separates expansion from contraction. It's also the first expansionary result since August 2018.
IHS Market said that the services sector in Australia continued to expand in October, and at a faster pace, with a seasonally adjusted services PMI score of 53.7. That's up from 50.8 in September and it moves further above the boom-or-bust line of 50 that separates expansion from contraction.
On Wall Street, stocks closed higher on Tuesday as traders seemed to be hoping for a definitive outcome from today's presidential election. Democratic candidate Joe Biden holds a clear lead in national polls and is also leading in several key swing states in the race to defeat President Donald Trump. Traders seem optimistic that the results of the election will be known at the end of the night without the need for lawsuits and recounts.
The Dow spiked 554.98 points or 2.1 percent to 27,480.03, the Nasdaq surged up 202.96 points or 1.9 percent to 11,160.57 and the S&P 500 jumped 58.92 points or 1.8 percent to 3,369.16.
The major European also showed strong moves to the upside on Tuesday. While the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index spiked by 2.3 percent, the French CAC 40 Index and the German DAX Index soared by 2.4 percent and 2.6 percent, respectively.
Crude oil prices climbed higher on Tuesday, thanks to a weaker dollar and hopes that OPEC and allies will likely postpone a plan to ease output cuts in January. WTI crude for December settled higher by $0.85 or about 2.3 percent at $37.66 a barrel.
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