Australian shares closed higher on Tuesday, with energy and utilities leading the gains, after a sell-off on Wall Street as tech stocks dragged.
The benchmark ASX 200 was up 0.9 per cent, to 6,763.
The broader All Ordinaries also climbed 0.9 per cent, to 6,953.
Despite the gains, more sectors were lower than higher. Energy, utilities and miners were the two top-performing sectors on the main index.
Collins Foods — which owns KFC, Taco Bell and Sizzler in Australia, Asia and Europe — jumped 11.6 per cent after impressing the market with its full-year earnings report.
The company's revenue was up 11.1 per cent, statutory earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation rose 12.5 per cent, underlying EBITDA up 12.6 per cent, and underlying net profit after tax grew 25 per cent.
Beach Energy (+6.6 per cent), Polynovo (+6.1 per cent), Northern Star Resources (+5.9 per cent), and Woodside Energy (+4.4 per cent) rounded out the top five stocks on the ASX 200.
Leading the declines were Imugene Limited (-10.4 per cent), Tyro Payments (10.1 per cent), Pointsbet (-9.6 per cent), Zip Co (-7.2 per cent) and Appen Limited (-5.9 per cent).
In other company news, Tasmanian salmon-farming company Tassal has rejected a third takeover offer from Cooke at $4.85 per share.
The failed bid valued Australia's biggest salmon producer at $1.04 billion.
Tassal said the proposal was not in the best interest of shareholders. The Canadian company Cooke has previously made takeover offers of $4.67 and $4.80 per share.
Tassal's share price jumped 15.6 per cent on the news.
Elsewhere, the Australian dollar was up 0.4 per cent, trading at 69.53 US cents.
Wall street down
US stocks closed lower on Monday, after oscillating earlier in the session, with weakness in interest-rate-sensitive megacaps such as Amazon.com, Microsoft and Alphabet (Google) among the worst performers.
"The reason for lack of direction this week and next week is investors are looking for what’s going to happen in the second-quarter reporting period," said Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist of CFRA Research.
All three indexes are on course to notch two straight quarterly declines for the first time since 2015.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 62.42 points, or 0.2 per cent, to 31,438. The S&P 500 lost 11.63 points, or 0.3 per cent, to 3,900. The Nasdaq Composite dropped 93.05 points, or 0.8 per cent, to 11,514.
Among the 11 major sectors on the S&P 500, eight ended the session in negative territory. Consumer discretionary suffered the largest percentage loss. Energy stocks were the clear winners, gaining 2.8 per cent on the day.
Shares of retail stock trading platform Robinhood Markets rose 14.0 per cent after media reports said Goldman Sachs changed the stock from neutral to sell.
They also appear set to post losses for June, which would mark three consecutive down months for the tech-heavy Nasdaq, its longest losing streak since 2015.
As of Friday, Mr Stovall said the S&P was on track to report its fifth worst year-to-date price decline since 1962.
"Every time the SPX rose by more than 20 per cent in a year, it fell by an average of 11 per cent, starting relatively early in the new year," he said.
"And all years where the decline started in the first half, [it] got back to break even before the year was out.
"No guarantee that’s going to happen this year, but the market could surprise us to the upside."
Rising oil prices helped put energy stocks out front, with economically sensitive small caps and semiconductors and transports also outperforming the broader market.
Economic data surprised to the upside, with new orders for durable goods and pending home sales beating expectations and adding weight to US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell's assertion that the economy is robust enough to withstand the central bank's attempts to rein in decades-high inflation without sliding into recession.
In Europe, the pan-European STOXX 600 index gained (+0.5 per cent), along with Germany’s DAX (+0.5 per cent) and Britain's FTSE (+0.7 per cent)
Spot gold gained 0.2 per cent, selling for $US1,828.40, in afternoon trading (Australian time).
On oil markets, Brent crude was up 1.1 per cent, to $US116.75 per barrel, while West Texas crude was up 1.3 per cent, to $US111.02 per barrel.
ABC News/Reuters
