Australian Market Significantly Lower

(RTTNews) - The Australian stock market is significantly lower on Thursday, giving up the gains in the previous two sessions, with the benchmark S&P/ASX 200 falling below the 7,000 mark, following the broadly negative cues from Wall Street overnight, as traders reacted to the US Fed's decision to continue raising interest rates despite recent turmoil in the banking industry.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Index is losing 58.00 points or 0.83 percent to 6,957.60, after hitting a low of 6,950.30 earlier. The broader All Ordinaries Index is down 63.00 points or 0.88 percent to 7,137.70. Australian stocks ended significantly higher on Wednesday.

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

Oil stocks are mostly lower. Origin Energy, Santos and Woodside Energy are edging down 0.2 to 0.3 percent each, while Beach energy is edging up 0.2 percent. In the tech space, Appen and Zip are losing almost 3 percent each, while Xero is down almost 2 percent, WiseTech Global is slipping almost 1 percent and Afterpay owner Block is declining more than 5 percent.

Among the big four banks, Commonwealth Bank and Westpac are edging down 0.3 to 0.4 percent each, while National Australia Bank and ANZ Banking are losing almost 1 percent each. Among gold miners, Northern Star Resources is gaining almost 2 percent, Evolution Mining is adding more than 2 percent, Newcrest Mining is up more than 1 percent and Resolute Mining is edging up 0.5 percent, while Gold Road Resources is edging down 0.4 percent.

In the currency market, the Aussie dollar is trading at $0.671 on Thursday.

On Wall Street, stocks showed a lack of direction throughout much of the session on Friday before coming under pressure in the final hour of trading. The major averages all moved sharply lower, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq pulling back after reaching its best intraday level in over a month.

The major averages finished the session at their worst levels of the day. The Dow plunged 530.49 points or 1.6 percent to 32,030.11, the Nasdaq tumbled 190.15 points or 1.6 percent to 11,669.96 and the S&P 500 dove 65.90 points or 1.7 percent to 3,936.97.

Meanwhile, the major European markets moved to the upside on the day. While the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index climbed by 0.4 percent, the French CAC 40 Index rose by 0.3 percent and the German DAX Index inched up by 0.1 percent.

Crude oil futures settled higher on Wednesday after data showed that crude inventories rose by 1.117 million barrels last week. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for May settled at $70.90 a barrel, gaining $1.23 or 1.8 percent.