The Australian sharemarket experienced a decline on Wednesday, mainly due to disappointing economic data from China and revised expectations regarding US interest rates. The S&P/ASX 200 index dropped by 0.3%, or 21.7 points, closing at 7393.1. This decline was influenced by losses in five out of the 11 industry sectors and followed a sell-off in Wall Street, prompted by US Federal Reserve policymaker Christopher Waller's comments discouraging near-term rate cuts.
The All Ordinaries index also decreased by 0.3%, while the S&P 500 and Dow Jones indices in the United States dropped by 0.4% and 0.6%, respectively. Matt Sherwood, the head of investment strategy at Perpetual, mentioned that the market was adjusting its expectations for early interest rate cuts and expressed concerns about the state of the Chinese economy as contributing factors to the decline in local shares.
Futures
The Dow Jones futures are pointing to a fall of 81 points.
The S&P 500 futures are pointing to a fall of 12.75 points.
The Nasdaq futures are pointing to a fall of 62.25 points.
The SPI futures are down 29 points.
Best and worst performers
The best-performing sector was Utilities, up 0.95 per cent. The worst-performing sector was Energy, down 1.20 per cent.
The best-performing large cap was Mercury NZ (ASX:MCY), closing 7.69 per cent higher at $6.30. It was followed by shares in Boral (ASX:BLD) and Computershare (ASX:CPU).
The worst-performing large cap was Evolution Mining (ASX:EVN), closing 17.33 per cent lower at $3.10. It was followed by shares in Newmont Corporation (ASX:NEM) and Seven Group Holdings (ASX:SVW).
Asian markets
Japan's Nikkei has gained 0.14 per cent.
Hong Kong's Hang Seng has lost 3.04 per cent.
China's Shanghai Composite has lost 0.19 per cent.
Commodities and the dollar
Gold is trading at US$2,023.10 an ounce.
Iron ore is 0.4 per cent higher at US$129.45 a tonne.
Iron ore futures are pointing to a 0.1 per cent fall.
Light crude is trading $0.63 lower at US$71.77 a barrel.
One Australian dollar is buying 65.83 US cents.
