News: BHP Australian shares fall for second straight day on Fed minutes; BHP drags

	  BHP shares plunge after third rejection by Anglo American 

	  Commodity stocks drag the benchmark 

	  Origin Energy hits near 9-year high 

(Updates to close)

Australian shares trimmed early losses but ended lower for a second straight session on Thursday after minutes from the U.S. Federal Reserve's latest policy meeting dialled down hopes of early rate cuts, while global miner BHP weighed on the benchmark.

The S&P/ASX 200 index (xjo) ended 0.5% lower at 7,811.80 points.

Shares of BHP Group (BHP) closed around 3% lower after its takeover target British miner Anglo American AAL.L rejected a sweetened bid, valuing it at 38.6 billion pounds ($49.10 billion).

Meanwhile, Wall Street too ended lower as investors parsed the minutes from the Federal Reserve's most recent meeting.

"The minutes served as a reminder that interest rate relief in the US is still at least several months down the track, which dented sentiment on equity markets," said Tim Waterer, chief market analyst at KCM Trade.

Mining stocks .AXMM ended 2.5% lower. "The decline in materials prices was likely the larger drag on BHP and the materials sector today," added Waterer.

Gold stocks .AXGD closed 3.7% lower, tracking declining bullion prices after minutes from Fed's meeting suggested it would wait for inflation to cool down before deciding on further rate cuts.

Evolution Mining (EVN) and Northern Star Resources (NST) ended 4.3% and 3.3% lower, respectively.

Rate-sensitive financials .AXFJ ended 0.6% lower with the "Big Four" banks ending in red between 0.8% and 1.1%.

Bucking the trend, shares of power retailer Origin Energy (ORG) ended 1.9% higher and also hit an almost nine year high during the day after it agreed with the state of New South Wales to delay the closure of Eraring coal-fired power plant by two years.

Technology stocks .AXIJ tracked the rally in chipmaker Nvidia NVDA.O after it estimated quarterly revenue above expectations and announced a stock split.

New Zealand's benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index (nz50) closed 0.7% higher at 11,809.48 points.

($1 = 0.7861 pounds)