[BENGALURU] Australian shares rose on Wednesday, supported by consumer and commodity stocks, but heavyweight banking shares fell on fears of stricter lending policies.
Supermarket operator Woolworths Group was among the biggest boosts to the benchmark, firming more than 3 per cent after it outlined plans to spin-off and list its drinks and hospitality businesses. Chinese iron ore prices have doubled in value this year amid supply concerns over Brazil's Vale SA after outages at several of its projects. Vale is the world's largest iron ore miner.
Bucking the trend, financial stocks, the largest sector in the ASX 200, dropped about 0.3 per cent with major pressure coming from bank stocks.