At midday on Wednesday, the benchmark S&P/ASX200 index was up 58.2 points, or 0.7 per cent, to 8,432.2, while the broader All Ordinaries was up 65.2 points, or 0.76 per cent, to 8,698.6.
The ASX seemed to be taking its lead from Wall Street, the S&P500 rose 0.7 per cent and the Nasdaq climbed 1.4 per cent.
"Despite several shocks over the last fortnight, the buy-the-dip attitude in US markets appears hard to shake," said Capital.com analyst Kyle Rodda.
"Barring any new tariff salvos from Trump, the markets shift attention to a couple of days of heavy data in the US."
Overnight a weekly estimate of US jobs openings fell by more than expected, suggesting a material cooling in job market conditions, and was seen as increasing the odds of a Federal Reserve rate cut in June.
In response the US dollar dropped while gold climbed to a fresh all-time high of $US2845 an ounce.
Every sector of the ASX was in the green at midday except for health care, which was down 0.6 per cent.
Materials/mining was the biggest gainer, up 2.0 per cent, with BHP up similarly, Fortescue climbing 2.1 per cent and Rio Tinto advancing 2.4 per cent.
Goldminer Northern Star had climbed 1.1 per cent and Gold Road Resources had advanced 1.0 per cent.
All of the big four banks were higher, with Westpac up 0.8 per cent, ANZ and NAB adding 0.5 per cent and CBA gaining 0.7 per cent.
Insignia Financial rose 7.3 per cent to $4.635 after the asset manager received a third non-binding takeover proposal, this one from Brookfield at $4.60 per share. It has competing offers from CC Capital and Bain Capital.
The Australian dollar was buying 62.56 US cents, from 62.06 US cents around 5pm Tuesday.
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