23:16

Australia’s sharemarket has dropped 1.4% after the opening bell; reversing a rally on Tuesday that followed more than a week of losses.

The benchmark ASX200 index is now down more than 10% over the past week and a half.

The Aussie market’s fall follows a plunge overnight on US markets, which responded to an emergency rate cut by the Federal Bank by shedding about 3%.

Banks, miners and consumer stocks have all been hit in an across-the-board selloff that reverses gains made by the market on Tuesday.

In early trade, Australia’s biggest bank the Commonwealth Bank fell more than 1.5% and rival ANZ was down almost 2%.

Mining giant BHP was down 1.2%, soft drink company Coca-Cola Amatil fell 1.1% and share registry provider Computershare tumbled 4.6%.

The ASX200 was up as much as 1.8% on Tuesday morning, but began to fall away in afternoon trade after the Reserve Bank of Australia cut official interest rates to a new record low of 0.5%.