Australia shares open higher as Biden inauguration boosts sentiment

Australian shares advanced on Thursday, helped by gains among technology and gold stocks, as broader risk sentiment was lifted after the swearing in of Joe Biden as the 46th U.S. President.

The S&P/ASX 200 index rose 0.8% to 6,770.4 points by 2345 GMT.

Overnight, U.S. stocks closed at record highs alongside global equity benchmarks as participants bet on further U.S. stimulus under the new Biden administration to fight the coronavirus-led economic slump.

Tech stocks soared 2.5% to be the best performing sector on the benchmark, tracking their peers on Wall Street as solid results from Netflix helped start a rally among shares of the rest of the FAANG group.

Buy-now-pay-later company Afterpay jumped 6% to hit a fresh record high, while AI and machine learning co Appen Ltd gained 2.5%.

Gold stocks rose 1.5% as prices of the yellow metal rose 1% on increased U.S. stimulus hopes, with top independent gold miner Newcrest Mining surging 2.7%.

Financials were also higher, with the so-called "big four" banks advancing between 0.4% and 1.9%.

Bucking the wider trend, energy stocks declined, with natural gas producer Woodside Petroleum Ltd and engineering services provider Worley Ltd falling 0.6% and 0.7%, respectively.

Woodside on Thursday forecast lower production in 2021, even as it reported a smaller-than-expected drop in fourth-quarter revenue.

Meanwhile, gas producing peer Santos Ltd rose 1% as it reported quarterly output hitting a record high, although quarterly revenue fell.

The number of issues on the ASX that advanced were 1,001 while 422 declined.

New Zealand's benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index rose 0.6%, helped by gains among utility and healthcare stocks.