ASX rises on Wall Street gains, as gaming sector grapples with Chinese regulation

Interest in mining and energy stocks is buoying the Australian sharemarket, with investors also taking a positive lead from Wall Street.

At 12:45pm AEST, the ASX 200 was up 0.25 per cent.

Mining stocks dominated the top of the index, but litigation funder Omni Bridgeway was in the lead, up 4.7 per cent. 

Other top performers were Minerals Resources, Nickel Mines, Pilbara Minerals, Ramelius Resources and Blackmores, which all gained between 3 and 4 per cent.  

Qantas shareholders were not feeling so optimistic, however. The airline’s shares were down 0.7 per cent, a day after the company announced it was standing down 2,500 workers to deal with border closures.

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Other losers were Chalice Mining (-4.3pc), GUD Holdings (-4.1pc), EML Payments (-3.4pc) and Boral (-2.4pc). 

The local currency edged higher overnight, after the Reserve Bank announced it would push ahead with tapering off COVID help. 

“We expect the RBA will continue to buy bonds at a pace of $4 billion per week from November 2021 until February 2022,” ANZ analysts noted this morning.

“Nevertheless, our view remains that the RBA will start its tightening cycle earlier than its forecasts currently imply.  

In Australia, after an extraordinary few weeks of the ASX 200 closing at record highs despite ongoing lockdowns, reporting season is also set to begin.

Retail sales down in monthly ABS figures 

Retail sales fell 1.8 per cent in June compared with May, but were 2.9 per cent higher than a year ago. 

Food retailing, or supermarket sales, rose 1.5 per cent as lockdown restrictions took hold. 

The largest falls were in cafes, restaurants and takeaway food services (-6.0 per cent), clothing, footwear and personal accessory retailing (-9.5 per cent), and department stores (-7.0 per cent).

On Wall Street, all major markets closed higher. 

The Dow and S&P both gained 0.8 per cent and the Nasdaq added 0.6 per cent.

The tech-laden Nasdaq was pushed along by blue-chip stock Apple, which gained 1.3 per cent.

But gains were capped by other heavyweight technology stocks, including Netflix, Tesla and Facebook, which continued to edge lower.

Deepening regulatory scrutiny in China also sent jitters through the global technology sector.

Shares in US and European-listed gaming companies fell after a steep sell-off in China’s social media and video games group Tencent.

An article in a Chinese state media outlet branding online video games “spiritual opium” has stoked fears the gaming sector could be next for regulation.

The article by an outlet affiliated with China’s biggest state-run news agency Xinhua cited Tencent’s Honor of Kings, saying minors were addicted to online games. It called for more curbs on the industry.

In the US, the creator of Grand Theft Auto, company Take-Two Interactive Software, plunged 7.7 per cent after it issued a disappointing sales forecast. 

ABC/wires