Oct 11 (Reuters) – Australian shares slipped on Monday as tech stocks tracked Wall Street peers lower, while heavy losses in casino operator Star Entertainment’s shares further weighed on the benchmark index.

The S&P/ASX 200 index fell as much as 1% to 7,255.2 points by midday, after gaining in the past two sessions.

Tech stocks slumped up to 2.9%, the biggest losers on the benchmark, tracking a weak finish on Wall Street on Friday after data showed a weaker-than-expected U.S. jobs growth in September.

Buy-now-pay-later juggernaut Afterpay slid as much as 4.5%, followed by Xero falling 3.2%.

Star Entertainment Group led individual losses by shedding as much as 20.8% after media reports bit.ly/3Ax3yPz accused the company of systemic governance failings, including suspected enabling of money laundering and large-scale fraud.

The ‘Big Four’ banks were all down more than 0.8%, dragging the financial index by about 0.6%.

Meanwhile, Australia was bracing for more COVID-19 infections and hospitalisations as it moved toward gradually easing restrictions, with the vast majority of its people getting vaccinated against the virus.

The Aussie energy sub-index was an outlier, gaining as much as 1.4% to its highest levels since January as a global energy crunch boosted oil prices.

Fuel supplier Ampol jumped 6.1% as New Zealand peer Z Energy agreed to a NZ$1.97 billion ($1.37 billion) takeover bid.

New Zealand’s benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index rose over 0.2% to 1,2543.70, with Z Energy shares gaining about 8%.