march 8 reuters  australian shares closed lower on tuesday pulled down by energy and mining stocks as investors grappled with the prospect of a us ban on oil imports from russia while new zealand equities entered correction territory australias spasx 200 index axjo closed 08 lower at 698030 extending losses to a third session oil prices seesawed near 14year highs as the united states considered acting alone to ban russian oil imports rather than teaming up with its european allies energy stocks axej slid 36 in their worst session in more than a month after jumping 53 in the previous session sector heavyweights woodside petroleum wplax and santos stoax dropped 42 and 38 respectively there might be a bit of profittaking going on said brad smoling managing director at smoling stockbroking big resources commodities and energy stocks are definitely going upward and i dont see that changing viva energy veaax declined 42 as the refiner said it would stop buying russian crude oil joining a growing number of companies including ampol aldax to sever trade ties with the country over its invasion of ukraine read more iron ore prices fell for the first time in seven sessions sending the australian metals and mining subindex axmm down 36 to its worst session in more than a week rio tinto rioax fortescue metals group fmgax and bhp group bhpax fell between 37 and 45 meanwhile shares of exportfocused healthcare companies axhj advanced 19 imugene imuax and csl led the gains rising 44 and 28 respectively gold stocks axgd added 12 after bullion prices rose overnight northern star resources nstax and newcrest mining ncmax ended 12 and 11 higher respectively financials axfj closed flat with two of the big four banks up between 02 and 1 data on tuesday showed the countrys business conditions rebounded in february as omicron cases reduced and supply bottlenecks across industries eased read more new zealands benchmark spnzx 50 index nz50 fell 14 to 1174495 retreating 107 since hitting a record closing high on jan 5 air new zealand airnz was down 65 while auckland international airport aianz dropped 29 reporting by upasana singh in bengaluru editing by subhranshu sahu