Australian shares rose the most in nearly a month on Tuesday, buoyed by banking stocks, with top lenders Commonwealth Bank of Australia and Macquarie hitting record highs.
The S&P/ASX 200 index ended 0.3% higher at 8,011.9, after jumping as much as 0.9% earlier in the session, its biggest intraday gain since Aug. 16. The benchmark had slipped 0.3% on Monday.
Financials ended the day 0.6% higher after hitting a record high during the session.
Analysts at UBS said valuations of bank stocks could be sustained as investors seek their relative safety compared to miners.
Separately, the country’s prudential regulator proposed to replace bank hybrid bonds with more reliable and less expensive forms of capital, as rising ownership of such securities among retail investors poses a financial stability risk.
Commonwealth Bank of Australia and Macquarie hit all-time highs during the session but pared some gains to end 0.6% and 1.6% higher, respectively.
Henry Jennings, a senior market analyst at Marcus Today, said Macquarie “was basking in AirTrunk glory” as it showed the lender could still do good deals.
Last week, Blackstone said it will acquire data centre group AirTrunk, jointly owned by Macquarie and Canada’s Public Sector Pension Investment Board, for an implied enterprise value of over A$24 billion ($16 billion).
Technology stocks tracked overnight gains on Wall Street to gain 0.6%.
Shares of software solutions developer Wisetech Global and data centre operator NEXTDC rose 2.1% and 1.1%, respectively.
Separately, a survey showed Australia’s consumer sentiment stayed downbeat in September as concerns over the economy and jobs bubbled to the surface even as worries over higher interest rates eased.
New Zealand’s benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index edged 0.1% higher to finish the session at 12,632.82 points.
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