Australian market opens flat as Wall Street rallies on Anthropic IPO filing

Australia’s main share index opened lower on Tuesday, with the S&P/ASX 200 down 34.1 points, or 0.4%, to 8,775.90 shortly after 11 a.m. AEDT. Eight of the 11 sector groups were in the red, led by declines in the major banks and consumer-goods companies.

Energy and mining stocks provided some support. Woodside and Santos added around 0.6%-0.7%, while copper miners BHP and Rio Tinto each rose 1.7%, reflecting continued demand for the metal used in AI data centres. Coal producers Yancoal and Whitehaven Coal also posted gains of about 1.4%-1.5%.

Star Entertainment surged 17.4% after reporting a turnaround to a $12 million profit in the September quarter and forecasting its first positive annual operating cash flow in two years.

In the technology segment, Codan climbed 2.5% and data-centre firms NextDC and Megaport rose 3.3% and 5.9% respectively, while software companies WiseTech Global, Xero and Technology One fell.

The decline in the Big Four banks – Commonwealth Bank, Westpac, ANZ and NAB – weighed on the broader market, with the banks each slipping between 0.8% and 1.7%.

Investor sentiment in the United States was buoyed by Anthropic’s filing for an initial public offering. The AI company, known for its Claude model, plans to list on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker “ANT.” Sources familiar with the deal said the company’s valuation expectations have shifted to a range of $1.4-$1.5 trillion, with a higher $1.75 trillion figure also possible.

U.S. equities rose as well: the S&P 500 gained 0.7%, the Dow Jones added 0.3% and the Nasdaq composite climbed 0.8%. Nvidia led the rally, up 2.4%, while Microsoft rose 1.5% after announcing voluntary buyouts for about 60,000 workers in several countries.

Analysts noted that AI-related stocks remain volatile as companies face higher borrowing costs for data-centre construction and chip purchases. Upcoming earnings reports from major tech firms, including Alphabet, Microsoft, Amazon and Intel, are expected to provide further insight into AI spending trends.

In other markets, Brazilian equities fell sharply after President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s re-election, while European indices showed modest gains, with France’s CAC 40 up 0.8% and yields on French government bonds easing.