Welcome to your five-minute recap of the trading day and how the experts saw it.
The numbers: The Australian sharemarket edged 0.3 per cent higher on Thursday thanks to strong real estate and health care stocks, but was held back by falls in the energy and mining sectors.
The S&P/ASX 200 settled after an early high to close at 6,528.4 points, 19.9 points higher than Wednesday. However, energy stocks followed oil prices lower, declining by 2.1 per cent as recession fears weighed on commodities. Woodside dropped by 2.6 per cent while Santos was down 2 per cent.
Falls in iron ore prices before trade began also hurt the mining sector, with BHP, Rio Tinto and Fortescue all falling slightly.
However, all other sectors were slightly higher, with real estate stocks up 2.3 per cent.
The lifters: Blackmores 5.4%, Goodman Group 4.9%, Block Inc 4.7%
The laggards: Lake Resources -16.7%, St Barbara Limited -13.5%, Pointsbet Holdings -11%
The lowdown: Oil prices have now fallen by more than 15 per cent since June 8, with West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude oil sinking further before Thursday trade to help sink ASX energy stocks.
According to Bloomberg, WTI crude oil was priced at US$104.16 a barrel as of 4.05pm AEST.
In a research note, RBC Capital Markets commodity strategist Michael Tran said the recent drop in prices was despite industry fundamentals remaining strong, but “macro concerns of a recession are clearly dominating sentiment”.
