Investing.com – Australia stocks were lower after the close on Thursday, as losses in the Financials, A-REITs and Telecoms Services sectors led shares lower.
At the close in Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 lost 0.84%.
The best performers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Arrium Ltd (AX:ARI), which rose 11.29% or 0.007 points to trade at 0.069 at the close. Meanwhile, Independence Group NL (AX:IGO) added 5.05% or 0.110 points to end at 2.290 and Ardent Leisure Group (AX:AAD) was up 4.23% or 0.090 points to 2.220 in late trade.
The worst performers of the session were Austal Ltd (AX:ASB), which fell 25.44% or 0.580 points to trade at 1.700 at the close. Whitehaven Coal Ltd (AX:WHC) declined 11.59% or 0.095 points to end at 0.725 and Mesoblast Ltd (AX:MSB) was down 8.13% or 0.135 points to 1.525.
Falling stocks outnumbered advancing ones on the Australia Stock Exchange by 580 to 355 and 136 ended unchanged.
Shares in Whitehaven Coal Ltd (AX:WHC) fell to all time lows; losing 11.59% or 0.095 to 0.725.
The S&P/ASX 200 VIX, which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was up 3.66% to 19.386.
Gold for February delivery was down 0.38% or 4.10 to $1072.40 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in January rose 0.79% or 0.29 to hit $37.45 a barrel, while the January Brent oil contract rose 0.78% or 0.32 to trade at $40.60 a barrel.
AUD/USD was up 0.73% to 0.7283, while AUD/JPY rose 0.89% to 88.58.
The US Dollar Index was up 0.22% at 97.55.