Australian shares pulled down by banks, healthcare; miners limit losses

Australian shares tracked broader Wall Street losses to end lower on Friday as banks, healthcare, technology stocks weighed, though miners tracked iron ore prices higher.

The S&P/ASX 200 index XJO fell 0.9% to 7,814.400 at the close of trade. The benchmark ended 1.7% higher on Thursday. The benchmark rose 0.8% for the week, its fourth consecutive weekly gain.

"I see the market continuing to move upward this month without too much headwind," said Brad Smoling, managing director at Smoling Stockbroking.

Wall Street slipped after hitting record highs in its previous session as investors continued to re-assess rate-cut bets.

Back in Sydney, the local shares rebounded overnight to snap a two-day winning streak amid market participants seeking clues for the Reserve Bank of Australia's rate-cut trajectory following the release of the U.S. CPI data and the domestic jobless data.

"The market remains extremely expensive and rate cut hope can move up and down, Mathan Somasundaram, CEO of Deep Data Analytics said.

In the local bourse, rate-sensitive financials XFJ led the losses with 0.7% drop.

"Jury is still out on the banks, we still have not seen the full impact of the commercial property problems. Some large properties have been sold a massive discount and this is still concerning," added Brad.

Three of the "Big Four" banks lost between 0.2% and 1.2%. Westpac WBC gained 0.2%. The sub-index recorded fourth consecutive weekly gains.

Health stocks XHJ snapped a five-day winning streak as it lost 2.3% with biotech giant CSL CSL losing 2.5%.

Bucking the trend, bellwether miners XXMM traded in green as it gained 0.7%, boosted by improving investor sentiment and demand outlook in top buyer China.

The sub-index recorded its best weekly gain since week-ending April 12.

Energy stocks XEJ shed 1.4% with Woodside Energy dropping 1.5% while real estate stocks (.AXRE) fell 1.7%.

Information technology stocks XXIJ fell 3.1% with software firm Xero XRO dropping 5%.

New Zealand's benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index NZ50G fell 0.2% to 11,699.7900.