The ASX hits its highest close since August as oil slides, and Qantas shares jump on the day it tells 850 staff their jobs are going

The Australian share market finished Tuesday at its highest level since late August, lifted by cheaper oil, a surge on Wall Street and a set of company announcements that investors liked more than the workers affected by them.

The S&P/ASX 200 closed up 1.1% at 9,129 points. Advancing stocks outnumbered decliners by roughly two to one.

What pushed the market up?

Two things arrived together. Oil kept falling after US President Donald Trump played down the chance of new strikes on Iran while talks continue, with Brent crude down about 1% to under US$92 a barrel in Asian trade. Brent has now lost about 16% in a week, its steepest weekly fall since the start of the pandemic.

For a country where petrol near $2.40 a litre has been dragging on household confidence, cheaper crude matters twice over: it eases the inflation that has driven five Reserve Bank rate rises, and it cuts costs for airlines, miners and transport companies.

The second push came from New York, where the S&P 500 rose about 2.3% on Monday for its best session since April, even as Nvidia fell.

Which shares moved most?

Real estate stocks had the best day of any sector, a day after having the worst. Gold miners and industrials were close behind, and the big banks rose about 1%, with Commonwealth Bank up about 1.8% before its first-quarter update on Wednesday. BHP gained about 1.1%.

Monadelphous was the standout, jumping about 14% to $32.26 after the engineering contractor forecast first-half revenue of about $1.7 billion, up from $1.53 billion a year earlier.

At the other end, Life360 dropped 13.5% to $19.32. The company’s quarterly revenue grew strongly, but investors focused on a trimmed outlook for its advertising business. Woolworths slipped almost 1%, a day after closing at a record high.

Why did Qantas shares rise on a day of job cuts?

Qantas closed almost 5.6% higher. The airline told staff on Tuesday that about 850 corporate roles in areas such as finance, procurement and human resources would move to Accenture over the coming years, mostly in India, with the first changes by mid-2027.

Chief executive Vanessa Hudson told staff: “Standing still is not an option for us.” The Australian Services Union said there was “really nothing innovative about shipping Australian jobs overseas”.

Investors were weighing two tailwinds at once: a lower wage bill and a falling fuel price. Fuel is among the airline’s largest costs, and it ran hundreds of millions of dollars over budget last financial year.

Does this mean the worst is over?

Not necessarily. The market’s rise sits awkwardly beside the mood of households: a survey released on Tuesday showed consumer sentiment at a four-year low, and mortgage holders at their gloomiest since 1994.

Share prices are responding to what might happen next, chiefly the hope that cheaper oil cools inflation. Households are responding to what has already happened to their repayments. Both can be right at the same time.

The Australian dollar was little changed at about 69.2 US cents.