"The Fed appears to have decided three things in the past month," he noted. "They do still know what drives inflation; it's going to rise; and they need to act."

Australian investors were buying energy and resource companies on Monday and oil producer Woodside climbed 1.5 per cent to $28.99, Origin Energy rose 2.6 per cent to $9.07 and Santos climbed 2.9 per cent to $5.03.

Diversified miner BHP, which has exposure to oil as well as metals, climbed 0.2 per cent to $29.23, while iron ore producer South32 rose 0.9 per cent to $3.41.

But banks lost some ground on Monday as the sector continues to face scrutiny from the ongoing royal commission into the financial sector.

By the end of the day, Commonwealth Bank was down 0.6 per cent at $74.89 and National Australia Bank had declined 0.6 per cent to $29.34. ANZ and Westpac traded marginally lower.

Cochlear fell 0.9 per cent to $109.53 as it started trading without rights to its latest dividend payout. Bellamy's Australia jumped 5.3 per cent to $22.30 on its first trading day as a member of the S&P/ASX 200.

- With wires

Stockwatch - Brambles

Brambles climbed 2.4 per cent to $9.90, bringing gains for the stock to around 7 per cent since March 8. The firm was upgraded to outperform at Credit Suisse on Friday, a day after the logistics firm held an investor day in London, headed by chief executive Graham Chipchase and several of his top executives. At the investor day, Brambles revealed it will spend $300 million over the next three years aggressively accelerating the levels of automation and robotics in its plants.

Japan

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe saw his support tumble in weekend opinion polls amid public anger over a cronyism scandal. Two of the polls showed public backing for Abe had fallen to its lowest level since he took office in 2012. They were conducted after the finance ministry admitted last week it had doctored documents related to the sale of public land at a heavily discounted rate to a nationalist school operator with ties to Abe's wife.

Asia

Asian share markets slipped into the red as caution gripped investors in a week in which the Federal Reserve is likely to hike US interest rates. Japan's Nikkei dropped 1.1 per cent while South Korea's Kospi lost 0.8 per cent. Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index edged up 0.1 per cent and China's Shanghai Composite index also edged up 0.1 per cent after China appointed US-educated former economist Yi Gang as its new central bank governor.

China housing

Average new home prices in China's 70 major cities rose 0.2 per cent in February from the previous month, compared with an increase of 0.3 per cent in January. Compared with a year ago, prices rose 5.2 per cent in the month, picking up from a 5.0 per cent increase in January. Prices fell in China's top-tier cities after a stabilisation in January, according to an official statement accompanying the data.

Oil

Brent crude futures edged down 40 cents to $65.81 per barrel, a drop of 0.6 per cent. The price fall in part reversed a sharp increase made in US trading hours on Friday, which came on concerns over tensions in the Middle East and trader reluctance to hold short positions ahead of the weekend. Oil markets are facing the possibility of a renewed glut after being in a slight deficit for much of last year.