Aug 16 (Reuters) - Australian shares are likely to open flat on Wednesday, tracking Wall Street which ended little changed after retailer stocks' results weighed, offsetting gains on strong U.S. retail sales data in July.
Worries about retailers' earnings and the outlook for home improvement stores dragged on the S&P, with Home Depot Inc (NYSE:HD) HD.N and Lowe's Companies Inc (NYSE:LOW) LOW.N representing biggest drags on the benchmark. local share price index futures YAPcm1 fell 0.1 pct or 5 points to 5699, a 58.5-point discount to the underlying S&P/ASX 200 index .AXJO close. The benchmark rose 0.5 percent on Tuesday.
New Zealand's benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index .NZ50 rose 1.72 points to 7815.46 at 2209 GMT.