(Updates to close) Australian shares rose for a third straight...

(Updates to close)

Australian shares rose for a third straight session on Monday to close at their highest level in three weeks, buoyed by gains in mining and financial stocks.

The S&P/ASX 200 index (xjo) closed 0.26% higher at 7,381.1, with miners .AXMM climbing 1% on the back of strong copper, aluminium and zinc prices amid supply constraints as electricity price hikes in Europe led to some production cuts.

Gains in the sector, which relies considerably on exports to China, were capped by the world's second-largest economy missing its third-quarter GDP growth estimates.

Sub-index heavyweights Rio Tinto (RIO) , Fortescue Metals (FMG) and BHP Group (BHP) advanced in a range of 0.9% to 1.9%.

"The gains (in mining stocks) were a part of the broader bounce-back from sell-offs earlier this year," said Dale Raynes, associate director at CPS Capital.

Financials .AXFJ also helped the benchmark as they rose 1%. The so-called "Big Four" banks gained between 0.5% and 1.6%.

Travel stocks rallied after Sydney eased more COVID-19 restrictions as vaccination rates increase. Qantas Airways (QAN) added 1.1%, while travel management firms Flight Centre (FLT) , Corporate Travel Management (CTD) and Webjet (WEB) rose between 0.4% and 2.2%.

Energy stocks .AXEJ rose 0.8% as oil prices hit their highest level in years on recovering demand from the pandemic and gas-to-oil switching for power generation.

Gains in financials and miners were cut by tech and gold stocks. Tech stocks .AXIJ slid 1.2%, tracking losses in Asia from weak China data, while gold stocks .AXGD dropped 1.3%.

Healthcare stocks .AXHJ , which are more export-reliant and earn in U.S. dollars, fell 1% on the back of the greenback's weakness in the previous session.

New Zealand's benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index (nz50) slipped 0.1% to 12,998.51 after the country's consumer price index beat expectations in the third quarter, jumping to its highest level in more than a decade and leading to inflation fears.