The share market’s bounce on better than expected Chinese economic growth has faltered as investor focus shifted to negative aspects of the data.
The market was slightly lower before the latest reading on the health of the world’s second largest economy, but picked up as the data showed an annual growth rate of 6.9 per cent, better than the 6.8 per cent many expected.
However those gains were lost again late in the session.
“We’re pretty flat,” IG market strategist Angus Nicholson said on Monday.
“The full data release was a lot more problematic.
Industrial production and fixed asset investment fell more than expected.
“We saw further digestion of that data starting to come into the market in the afternoon and that’s prompted a bit of selling.”
Resources and material stocks lost ground, as they are heavily exposed to the Chinese economy.
BHP Billiton fell 29 cents to $24.71, Rio Tinto lost 34 cents to $53.35 and Fortescue Metals eased 10 cents to $2.30.
Among the banks, Westpac resumed trading after last week’s launch of a $3.5 billion capital raising, and gained $1.10 to $31.34.
National Australia Bank climbed 19 cents to $31.96, ANZ added 19 cents to $31.96, while Commonwealth Bank dropped 12 cents to $76.43 after it announced it was refunding $7.6 million to customers after failing to fully deliver the benefits of an agribusiness package.
Casinos operator Crown Resorts fell 12 cents to $11.84 as it proposed to add a new luxury six-star hotel tower to its casino and other hotels at Melbourne’s Southbank.
Wine supplier Treasury Wine Estates jumped 94.4 cents, or 14.6 per cent, to $7.40 as it raised $368 million through a share issue to help fund its purchase of Diageo’s US and UK wine operations, and came out of a trading halt.
KEY FACTS
* At 1622 AEDT on Monday, the benchmark S&P/ASX200 index was up 1.5 points, or 0.03 per cent, at 5,269.7 points.
* The broader All Ordinaries index was up 0.8 points, or 0.02 per cent, at 5,304.5 points.
* The December share price index futures contract was down 17 points at 5,235 points, with 20,818 contracts traded.
* National turnover was 1.6 billion securities worth $3.85 billion.