Market report: Biotechs snap six-week winning streak as wider market gains

Australian biotech stocks slipped into the red for the first week in seven today while the wider market managed to sneak into the black.

Closing today at 4777.4 points, the S&P/ASX200 index finished lower today, weighed down by weaker resources and banking stocks, but it was up by more than 100 points for the week. With Christmas just a day away investors were generally cautious, with all major sub-indices down today.

Looking abroad, Asian markets were down as investors responded to continued weakness in metals prices. US markets were down on Thursday amid mixed economic data.

After closing just 22 points shy of 9,000 last week, the S&P/ASX 200 Heathcare Index fell back to 8932.3 points today, its first backward slide in seven weeks.

The majors were not to blame, with ResMed up 82 cents to $35.6, while Cochlear crawled ahead by five cents. CSL was, however, down 47 cents to $36.35. Meanwhile, the fourth biggest stock on the index, Ramsay Health, added a dollar to close at $17.63.

Looking at today’s best and worst performers, analgesic developers ORxPharma gained 8.55 percent to close the week on $1.46, while xenotransplantation specialists Living Cell Technologies gained eight percent to $0.135.

Worst performer was eye-disease specialists Psividacor CDI, which lost a whopping 29 percent after announcing that its collaborative partner in the US had been denied a new drug application (NDA) by the FDA for its candidate Iluvien. It closed today at $4.25.