Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Tuesday, as losses in the Telecoms Services, IT and Financials sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 lost 0.40%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Western Areas Ltd (AX:WSA), which rose 9.47% or 0.270 points to trade at 3.120 at the close. Galaxy Resources Ltd (AX:GXY) added 8.33% or 0.025 points to end at 0.325 and St Barbara Ltd (AX:SBM) was up 4.19% or 0.125 points to 3.105 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Infigen Energy (AX:IFN), which lost 4.97% or 0.040 points to trade at 0.765 in late trade. Medibank Private Ltd (AX:MPL) declined 3.98% or 0.100 points to end at 2.410 and Bluescope Steel Ltd (AX:BSL) shed 3.91% or 0.310 points to 7.610.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 610 to 441 and 337 ended unchanged on the Sydney Stock Exchange.
The S&P/ASX 200 VIX, which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was up 0.58% to 13.441.
In commodities trading, Gold for December delivery was down 0.47% or 6.35 to $1337.75 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in November fell 0.15% or 0.07 to hit $45.86 a barrel, while the December Brent oil contract fell 0.27% or 0.13 to trade at $47.80 a barrel.
AUD/USD was up 0.39% to 0.7666, while AUD/JPY rose 0.91% to 77.31.
The US Dollar Index was up 0.07% at 95.28.