Australian shares opened lower on Thursday as the major banks led losses across the index following Commonwealth Bank\u2019s biggest-ever one-day plunge.<\/p>\n
The S&P\/ASX 200 Index retreated 10.80 points, or 0.1 per cent, to 8619.60 at 10.24am AEST \u2013 putting the benchmark at risk of falling for a fifth consecutive session.<\/p>\n
Financials were the weakest as Commonwealth Bank dropped 0.7 per cent after falling by 10.4 per cent on Wednesday in its biggest loss on record after a weaker-than-expected quarterly profit and concerns about changes to negative gearing. ANZ lost 0.9 per cent, Westpac by 1.1 per cent and National Australia Bank by 1.6 per cent.<\/p>\n
ASX Limited bucked the trend to rise 1.3 per cent after it appointed Euronext executive Anthony Attia as chief executive from September 1, following a global search process caused by the departure of Helen Lofthouse.<\/p>\n
Including financials, there were nine sectors weaker. Technology was mixed as WiseTech Global dropped 4.5 per cent and Xero by 1.7 per cent after its profit fell to $NZ167.4 million ($137 million) for the full year ended March 31, down from $NZ227.8 million the year prior.<\/p>\n
Megaport rocketed 24.6 per cent after it secured $254 million worth of long-term network and storage contracts through its newly minted Latitude.sh subsidiary and reaffirmed its FY26 guidance. The three contracts across two US-based customers represent $90.6 million in annualised recurring revenue.<\/p>\n
BHP spiked to a new intraday record of $62.70 before last trading 1.5 per cent higher following further overnight gains in copper. Materials were further supported by a 0.7 per cent jump in Rio Tinto and a 0.8 per cent rise for Fortescue.<\/p>\n
Stocks in focus<\/p>\n
In company news, Coles retreated 0.9 per cent as the Federal Court ruled that the supermarket giant had misled shoppers over discounts advertised in its store promotions.<\/p>\n
Listed car parts retailer Bapcor tumbled 20.4 per cent after it downgraded its FY26 EBITDA guidance from $150 million to $160 million provided in February to between $144 million and $150 million due to deteriorating trading conditions since the start of the Middle East conflict.<\/p>\n
GrainCorp dropped 11.6 per cent after its first-half profit fell to $33 million from $69 million 12 months earlier as oversupply in global grain markets and weak pricing compressed margins across the supply chain.<\/p>\n
Worley rose 2.9 per cent after it announced a new $300 million stock buyback, following the end of a $500 million buyback three weeks ago.<\/p>\n
OOh!media climbed 1.9 per cent as it said first-quarter revenue growth in Australia accelerated ahead of expectations, but warned pressure on billboard earnings and higher rents on premium sites would weigh on first-half margins.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australian shares opened lower on Thursday as the major banks led losses across the index following Commonwealth Bank\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":402492,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[138,219,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-426526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economy","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426526","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=426526"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426526\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/402492"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=426526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=426526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=426526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}