Stocks on Wall St were little changed on Tuesday, with investors remaining cautious as they continued to digest Standard & Poor's recent downgrade warning for the euro zone.
The Dow Jones Index was up 61 points at 12,158 and the Nasdaq Composite was down 9 points at 2647.
The FTSE in London gained 0.4%, but the DAX in Frankfurt fell 0.7% and the CAC-40 in Paris was flat.
The Reserve Bank of Australia cut the cost of borrowing from 4.5% to 4.25% on Tuesday, due to slowing inflation and the drag of Europe's debt crisis on global economic growth.
The Australian 200 Index fell 59 points, or 1.4%, to close at 4262 and the NZX 50 fell 10 points to close at 3291.
At 8.30am on Wednesday, the New Zealand dollar was trading at 77.96 US cents, 76.17 Australian cents, 50.03 pence, 60.50 yen and 0.5823 euro. The Trade Weighted Index was at 69.00.
Brent crude oil was trading at $US111.22 per barrel and gold was trading $US1719 per ounce.
