The Australian sharemarket closed higher on Tuesday, with DroneShield extending its rally and Goodman Group surging after announcing a new partnership to develop data centres.
The ASX 200 finished 1.1% higher at 8,795.7, a 20-day high. All 11 sectors were up during the session, with real estate investment trusts leading gains at 3.1%.
DroneShield’s shares climbed 9%, continuing yesterday’s rally after it said it would establish a mandatory minimum shareholding policy for directors and senior managers.
Its stock plummeted in November after executives sold off shares.
Goodman Group shares jumped 8.6% after it announced an A$14 billion partnership with Canada Pension Plan Investment Board to develop data centres in Europe.
The 435 megawatt project will include two data centres in Paris and one facility in each of Frankfurt and Amsterdam. Construction will begin by 30 June 2026, Goodman Group said.
Austal stock spiked 6.7%, extending gains after it received a contract to build two more patrol boats for the Australian Border Force on Friday.
Commonwealth Bank said today that it would pay a further $68 million to customers on Centrelink payments who were wrongly charged unusually high fees, sending shares up 2.2%.
Australian retail spending continued to climb in November and December, per the Westpac-DataX Card Tracker Index, though Black Friday sales growth was modest.
“The detailed card data point to a solid but unspectacular turnout for ‘Black Friday’ and ‘Cyber Week’ sales,” according to Westpac head of Australian macro-forecasting Matthew Hassan.
“Total card activity across discretionary goods categories was up around 5% on the same period last year.”
The ASX will end trading at 2:10 pm AEDT (4 am GMT) tomorrow, and will be closed on Christmas Day and Boxing Day.
On the bond markets, 10-year and 2-year rates were 1% and 1.2% lower at 4.76% and 4.036%, respectively.
