The Australian sharemarket closed higher on Monday following better-than-expected household spending data.
The ASX 200 finished up 0.5% at 8,759.40 points. Eight of its 11 sectors rose with consumer discretionary leading with a gain of 2.1%.
Australia’s household spending increased by 1% in November, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) said today. This was lower than the 1.4% growth seen in October, but well above consensus forecasts of 0.6%.
“Growth in household spending was broad, with eight of the nine spending categories rising in November,” said ABS head of business statistics Tom Lay. Goods spending was buoyed by Black Friday sales, while services spending was raised by major concerts and sporting events.
Shares in Light & Wonder surged 17.6% after it agreed to a US$127.5 million settlement in an intellectual property lawsuit filed by Aristocrat Leisure. Aristocrat’s shares were up 0.1%.
Aristocrat alleged that Light & Wonder used its copyrighted materials to develop two of its slot machine games. Light & Wonder has acknowledged that “certain Aristocrat math information” was used when developing the games, and will both end commercialisation of these games and remove existing installations.
Super Retail shed 5.5% after its first-half profits missed expectations by 7.1%, despite record sales.
Coles and Woolworths were up 2.4% and 0.8% respectively, despite ACCC chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb saying the agency could begin legal action against these supermarket chains for price gouging within the next 12 months.
Two-year bond yields were up 0.02% to 4.012% while 10-year yields were up 0.1% to 4.688%.
