Australian shares fell on Tuesday, dragged lower by heavy losses in technology stocks after Apple Inc <AAPL.O> flagged a revenue miss amid weakening demand and production in China from the coronavirus outbreak.
The iPhone maker said it will not meet its revenue outlook for the current quarter, as some of its retail stores in China, which supplied 18% of revenue in the year-ago quarter, remain closed or are operating at reduced hours.
The S&P/ASX 200 index <.AXJO> was down 0.2% at 7,111.8 points, as of 0100 GMT, amid subdued trading as the U.S. markets were closed for a holiday on Monday.
The Australian tech sub-index <.AXIJ> led the declines, falling 3.3% to its worst session in more than four months.
Among the top decliners was Altium Ltd <ALU.AX>, losing up to 15.5% to mark its worst day in over seven years on bleak outlook following the outbreak.
"Tech companies in Australia trade on a very solid price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio, so even a small miss would give the stock a good knock-around, and that would appear to be happening with Altium," James McGlew, executive director of corporate stockbroking at Argonaut said.
Meanwhile, worries of economic impact from the outbreak, which has so far killed more than 1,800 people in China, continued to dampen the sentiment.
The uncertainty regarding the exact impact of coronavirus just means that the high P/E stocks will look fragile, McGlew added.
Among other decliners, the healthcare sector <.AXHJ> fell up to 0.8%, with medical equipment maker Ansell Ltd <ANN.AX> slipping 5.4%, marking its worst session in nearly 18 months, after it flagged impact to earnings from coronavirus and headwinds in the manufacturing sector.
Coles Group <COL.AX> fell up to 1.5% after the country's second-biggest grocery chain posted near-flat half-year earnings.
Meanwhile, the country's top two lenders Commonwealth Bank of Australia <CBA.AX> and Westpac Banking Corp <WBC.AX> advanced as much as 0.7% and 0.4%, respectively.
The mining sub-index <.AXMM> reversed course from earlier in the session to gain up to 0.6%.
The world's biggest miner BHP Group <BHP.AX> gained 0.6% after a 39% jump in its half-year profit, supported by Chinese demand and high iron ore prices, while smaller rival Rio Tinto <RIO.AX> added 0.7%.
Across the Tasman sea, New Zealand's benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index <.NZ50> hit a record high of 11,938.31, rising as much as 0.5%.
Dairy farm a2 Milk Co <ATM.NZ> and Auckland International Airport <AIA.NZ> were among the top gainers, adding 1.1% and 1.3%, respectively.
(Reporting by Sameer Manekar in Bengaluru, Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips)
