The Australian sharemarket is expected to mark the start of five weeks of political campaigning by opening slightly lower on Friday.
As Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was setting 3 May as the date for 18 million Australians to vote for a new government, the futures market was pointing to a weaker start by the Australian Securities Exchange’s (ASX) benchmark index.
At 9:20 am AEDT (10:20 pm GMT Thursday) the S&P/ASX 200 June share price index contract was trading down eight points (0.1%) from the previous settlement at 8,006.
The catalyst was a lower close by United States equities markets with the Dow Jones Industrial Average slipping 0.4%, the S&P 500 easing 0.3% and the Nasdaq Composite shedding 0.5%.
“US share markets tumbled on Wednesday, dragged down by losses in big technology stocks as investors awaited information about forthcoming U.S. tariffs expected to be enacted next week,” CommSec said in its Morning Report.
The Australian sharemarket had closed lower on Thursday, ending five successive days of gains, with the S&P/ASX 200 index falling 0.4% to 7,969.0.
Burrell Stockbroking wealth adviser Adam Dight said he expected investors to mostly sit on the sidelines until the end of the election campaign.
“Everyone is just going to put the cue away now. Nothing will happen for the next (five) weeks,” he said.
However Dight noted U.S. companies would report their next quarterly results in mid-April amid expectations of 10-12% growth in earnings per share.
“It’s still a special place in the world. We haven’t seen the demise of the U.S. yet,” he said.
In fixed interest markets, Australian Treasury bond yields edged down with the 10-year rate falling 0.18% to 4.496% and the two-year rate falling 0.13% to 3.765%.
