{"id":881588,"date":"2026-09-06T02:16:14","date_gmt":"2026-09-06T02:16:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/881588\/"},"modified":"2026-09-06T02:16:14","modified_gmt":"2026-09-06T02:16:14","slug":"asx200-every-september-the-australian-share-market-loses-30-billion-is-it-about-to-happen-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/881588\/","title":{"rendered":"ASX200: Every September, the Australian share market loses $30 billion. Is it about to happen again?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Australian<\/a> sharemarket started September in dreadful fashion, as the ASX200 shed nearly 1 per cent on Wednesday<\/a> alone to hit a 20-day low.<\/p>\n

While it rebounded and is flat for the month so far, for this time of year, the turbulence is an all-too-familiar story.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

September is the Australian sharemarket\u2019s worst month of the year.\u00a0Bloomberg<\/p>\n

September has long been the weakest time of the year for the local sharemarket, as well as those overseas.<\/p>\n

Over the last 10 years, the ASX\u2019s average performance for the month has been a $30.66 billion loss.<\/p>\n

In 2020 \u2013 an admittedly tumultuous economic year thanks to the pandemic \u2013 the overall market capitalisation of the Australian sharemarket fell by $63 billion.<\/p>\n

In 2023, the loss was almost $80 billion.<\/p>\n

The year before, more than $175 billion.<\/p>\n

\u201cSeptember has earned its reputation for being a torrid month for investors,\u201d eToro lead Asia-Pacific analyst Josh Gilbert told nine.com.au.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cOver the past 20 years, it’s the worst month of the year for the ASX 200, averaging a loss of around 0.47 per cent.\u201d<\/p>\n

Part of the carnage has been coincidental.\u00a0<\/p>\n

September has had its fair share of sharemarket-shaking events, going back far beyond the last decade.<\/p>\n

This includes 2008, when the Global Financial Crisis went into overdrive when Lehman Brothers collapsed on the 15th, the 9\/11 attacks in 2001, the dot-com bubble was still rocking markets in 2001, and the aftermath of Iraq\u2019s invasion of Kuwait, including surging oil prices, in 1990.<\/p>\n

More recently, 2021 saw Chinese real estate giant Evergrande miss crucial payments en route to its eventual collapse<\/a>, and a year later unexpectedly hot inflation in the US had flow-on effects across global markets.<\/p>\n

\"Inflation<\/p>\n

Several major global events have hit Australian investors hard in Septembers past.\u00a0Getty Images<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s not just bad luck \u2013 there are structural reasons why red outweighs green as the colour of the month, many related to reporting season finishing up in late August.<\/p>\n

\u201cBy the time September rolls around, most of the earnings are done, the guidance is out, and there are not many catalysts left,\u201d Gilbert said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cStocks that disappointed during results can be sold off during September as fund managers reposition, while those that beat expectations may have already priced in the good news.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe other part is that a big chunk of the market goes ex-dividend around now, so prices get marked down by the amount that’s about to land in shareholders’ accounts.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThat’s something worth knowing because that\u2019s not weakness in the market, it\u2019s just the market paying you.\u201d<\/p>\n

Will it happen again?<\/p>\n

No one knows for certain what the sharemarket will do in the coming weeks.<\/p>\n

However, observers would be forgiven for hearing echoes of some of those major previous catalysts in today\u2019s financial<\/a> circumstances \u2013 high oil prices thanks to a Middle East conflict, concerns about a possible AI bubble, and bond yields at their highest level since the GFC.<\/p>\n

\u201cSharemarkets are likely to remain volatile,\u201d AMP deputy chief economist Diana Mousina wrote in a note last week.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201c[There\u2019s a] lack of any long-term resolution to the Iran War and hit to global oil supplies, stretched valuations, sticky inflation, political uncertainty associated with Trump and the midterm elections and worries about the impact of AI and whether there is an AI bubble.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

There are rising fears of another interest rate hike before the end of the year.\u00a0Peter Braig\/AFR<\/p>\n

Locally, fears of another interest rate hike<\/a> are increasing on the back of hotter-than-expected inflation<\/a> and GDP growth<\/a>, which Gilbert says will be felt across some sectors of the sharemarket.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe’re sitting near record highs after a reporting season in which the outlooks did more damage than the results, so there’s not much margin for error,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSeasonality certainly isn\u2019t on the market’s side this September, and neither are the fundamentals right now,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

However, some analysts are predicting good news for traders; IG\u2019s Troy Sycamore believes the ASX200\u2019s all-time high set in August will be tested and possibly broken in the coming weeks, while Mousina said investors are likely to relatively content over the next year.<\/p>\n

\u201cReturns should still be okay for the next 12 months as a whole thanks to continuing economic growth with recession avoided and strong global profit growth and likely rate cuts next year,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The information provided on this website is general in nature only and does not constitute personal financial advice. The information has been prepared without taking into account your personal objectives, financial situation or needs. Before acting on any information on this website you should consider the appropriateness of the information having regard to your objectives, financial situation and needs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Australian sharemarket started September in dreadful fashion, as the ASX200 shed nearly 1 per cent on Wednesday…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":881589,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[64,63,99],"class_list":["post-881588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/881588","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=881588"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/881588\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/881589"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=881588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=881588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=881588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}