Australia shares rise tracking Wall Street peers; investors await RBA minutes

Australian shares rose on Monday, tracking gains in Wall Street, while investors awaited the minutes of the local central bank's latest policy meeting for interest rates cues.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 index XJO rose 0.5% to 8,209.5 points by 1151 GMT. The index fell 1.2% on Friday.

Stocks on Wall Street ended higher on Friday after a choppy trading session following a failed meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

The S&P 500 moved lower immediately after the clash between the two leaders before recovering and ending the day with a gain.

Investors await minutes of the Reserve Bank of Australia's (RBA) February monetary policy meeting, due on Tuesday, for clearer insight into the country's interest rate trajectory.

The central bank cut rates last month for the first time in more than four years, but warned it was cautious about the prospects of further easing.

All sectors were in the green, with heavyweight miners leading gains with a 0.5% rise. The world's largest listed miner BHP Group BHP rose 0.4%.

Rio Tinto RIO added 1.4%, after it said its East Intercourse Island facility at the Dampier iron ore export port in Western Australia had resumed operations after flooding from Tropical Cyclone Sean.

Financial stocks XFJ inched up 0.2%, with the 'big four' banks gaining between 0.5% and 0.7%.

Gold XGD and technology XXIJ stocks rose 0.4% and 0.6%, respectively.

In corporate news, a filing showed that the Australian Securities Exchange suspended trading in Star Entertainment Group SGR shares on Monday after the casino operator missed its first-half earnings report deadline last week.

New Zealand's benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index NZ50G fell 0.7% to 12,513.57.