(MENAFN - ProactiveInvestors - Australia) Australian shares have bounced back from yesterday's plunge after Reserve Bank of Australia chairman Glenn Stevens gave an upbeat testimony at a parliamentary committee in Canberra.
This more than offset negative leads from Wall Street, leading the All Ords to climb up 38.1 points, or 0.8%, to 5,036.7 mirrored by the benchmark S&P ASX 200, which put on 38 points, or 0.8%, to 5,018.1.
Sectors were green across the board though Materials were outpaced by the majority of the market with a small 25.9 point, or 0.2%, increase to 10,668.4.
Wall Street was down last night due to a disappointing reading on manufacturing in the Philadelphia area, lingering worries from the U.S. Federal Reserves January policy meeting and weaker-than-expected data from the Eurozone.
Investors are also wary as the sequester still looms in Washington. The sequester refers to the 85 billion in spending cuts set to take effect March 1 unless a compromise between Democrats and Republicans can be reached.
Reports out of China have clearly demonstrated the Chinese Government's decision to implement measures to cool property prices with house prices rising in 54 cities with Guangzhou leading the way with a 4.7% increase.
Despite the general performance of the market, the largest resource companies were down with BHP Billiton (ASX: BHP) shedding 0.30, or 0.81%, to 36.87, Rio Tinto (ASX: RIO) down 0.58, or 0.86%, to 66.72 and Woodside Petroleum (ASX: WPL) down 0.25, or 0.66%, to 37.70.
Conversely, Newcrest Mining (ASX: NCM) gained 0.33, or 1.55%, to 21.68, Fortescue Metals Group (ASX: FMG) put on 0.03, or 0.63%, to 4.83 and Santos (ASX: STO) gained 0.15, or 1.26%, to 12.05 despite posting a 31% fall in net profit and a 10% increase in production.
The big four banks were all up with Commonwealth Bank (ASX: CBA) up 0.74, or 1.14%, to 65.55, Westpac Bank (ASX: WBC) up 0.38, or 1.29%, to 29.87, National Australia Bank (ASX: NAB) up 0.40, or 1.36%, to 29.82 and ANZ Bank (ASX: ANZ) up 0.18, or 0.64%, to 28.16.
Other notable gainers include Telstra (ASX: TLS), which put on 0.06, or 1.33%, to 4.56, Woolworths (ASX: WOW) up 0.42, or 1.24%, to 34.27 and Wesfarmers (ASX: WES) with a 0.41, or 1.04%, increase to 39.81.
Nevada Iron (ASX: NVI) put on 16.13% to 0.18 after reporting a 40% increase in contained iron resources at its East Deposit in Nevada to 5.7 million tonnes.
The expanded resource, along with recent increases in the West Deposit and Section 5 resources that bring total contained resources at the Buena Vista Iron Project to 33.4Mt.
Further drilling is planned to upgrade the resource to the Indicated category, and to determine if there is potential to expand the resource given the limited drilling on the East Deposit to date.
Aphrodite Gold (ASX: AQQ) put on 13.73% to 0.058 on the back of high gold recoveries of up to 96.8% from its metallurgical testwork on samples collected from its Aphrodite deposit in Western Australia.
The testwork also demonstrated that further flotation work returns high gold recoveries with excellent very low mass pull to concentrate.
Optimisation testwork is in progress to improve Pressure Oxidation and flotation gold recoveries even further.
