Australian stocks fell today as investors played it safe waiting for the result of a German vote on whether to approve new powers for a European bailout fund.

At the close, S&P/ASX200 was down 31.2 points at 4008.3 while the All Ordinaries index lost 29.8 points or 0.7 per cent. The market opened lower on negative leads from the U.S. before recovering slightly in the afternoon but still underperformed against regional sharemarkets.

China's stockmarket dropped 1.1 percent to a nearly 15-month closing low while Korea posted gains but Japan traded flat.

"Growth in the US and Europe continues to be challenging and the market is wary that Chinese exports are not immune," said Ben Taylor, a trader at CMC Markets.

The Eurozone debt crisis is one of the biggest concerns of investors as Germany will vote on expanding the size of the EU's rescue fund for Greece. Several other EU parliaments still need to ratify changes to the fund which would stave off a global recession.

''Once it's established, markets should see a way out of this mess," Macquarie Private Wealth division director Lucinda Chan said. ''I don't expect everything to be fixed overnight but at least (if) certainty comes into play it will settle the mood of the market at least.''

Australia's miners were hit with stocks registering the biggest falls on the market. BHP Billiton dropped 48 cents or 1.4 percent to $35.04 and Rio Tinto dropped to $62.45. Fortescue Metals Group went down 1.2 percent and Newcrest Mining lost 2.7 percent.

Oil Search shares lost 5 cents to $5.62, Woodside Petroleum rose 20 cents to $32.14 and Santos added 21 cents to $11.27.

Uranium miner Paladin Energy was the weakest stock on the ASX 100, plunging 14 cents, or 10.7 per cent, to $1.17.

The Australian dollar performed better than expected but was still down. The Aussie was at at $US0.9800, down from $US0.9875 late yesterday. Against the Japanese yen, the Australian dollar was at Y75.143, down from Y75.625.