THE US Federal Reserve's long-awaited rate rise has delivered some festive cheer to the Australian sharemarket after local stocks closed higher for a second straight day. 
The benchmark ASX 200 finished up 1.5 per cent yesterday after domestic investors responded positively to the Fed's 0.25 percentage point hike, continuing the buying that sparked a 2.4 per cent rise the previous day.
The big four banks spearheaded the surge, each rising about 2 per cent. "At the very least, the markets are quite comfortable with the Fed rate rise and the comments made by Janet Yellen," CMC Markets chief market analyst Ric Spooner said. The benchmark ASX 200 index closed up 73.6 points, or 1.5 per cent, at 5102 points while the broader All Ordinaries index was up 71.9 points, or 1.4 per cent, at 5150.6.
Commonwealth Bank made up the remainder of its losses over the past week when it rose $1.60, or 2 per cent, to $80.69. Westpac rose 72c, or 2.3 per cent, to $32.18, NAB was up 56c, or 2 per cent, to $28.94 and ANZ was up 52c, or 2 per cent, to $26.53.
Telco and healthcare stocks also joined in, with Telstra closing 11c, or 2.1 per cent, higher at $5.44 and CSL gaining $2.64 to finish 2.6 per cent higher at $103.53.But the good news didn't extend to energy. Oil Search shed 11c to $6.11, Origin Energy was down 13c to $4.40 and Woodside Petroleum was off 23c to $26.82.