Stocks flew to a three-week high on the back of a US tech rally before paring gains as financials marked a 17-month low.
The ASX 200 surged 38 points in early trade but reduced its gain to 17 points or 0.3% at 5928 by the halfway mark of the session. The index remained on track for a fourth straight winning week since the market bottomed at the start of the month.
Takeover offers for HSO and MDL helped boost sentiment. The health sector jumped 2.2%, gold 1.9% and utilities 1.9%. Index gains were tempered by a slide in the financial sector (-0.7%) to its weakest level since November 2016. The sector has been battered by revelations at the Royal Commission into banking.
Overnight, the S&P 500 rallied 1.04% as investors applauded strong quarterlies from Facebook and AMD. This morning, S&P 500 futures slipped 6.75 points or 0.23% despite a well-received after-market earnings report from Amazon.
"The earnings reports have been good thus far," Randy Frederick, vice president of trading and derivatives at the Schwab Center for Financial Research in the US, told CNBC. "I see no reason why that wouldn't continue."
China's Shanghai Composite improved 0.12%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng 0.52% and Japan's Nikkei 0.42%.
Crude oil futures faded 28 cents or 0.41% this morning to US$67.91 a barrel. Gold futures dipped 40 cents or 0.03% to US$1,317.50 an ounce. The dollar was buying 75.52 US cents.
Slow morning. Thank God for the excitement around GMC to keep us awake. Ahem. Trading: small bite at ZNO, which in keeping with the theme of the morning, has done naff all. Anyone read any good books?
