Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Friday, as losses in the Telecoms Services, Energy and IT sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 lost 0.11%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were ANZ Banking Group (AX:ANZ), which rose 2.84% or 0.790 points to trade at 28.640 at the close. G8 Education Ltd (AX:GEM) added 2.79% or 0.065 points to end at 2.395 and Greencross Ltd (AX:GXL) was up 2.55% or 0.110 points to 4.420 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Credit Corp Group Ltd (AX:CCP), which lost 7.11% or 1.340 points to trade at 17.500 in late trade. Bellamys Australia Ltd (AX:BAL) declined 6.40% or 1.150 points to end at 16.810 and Beach Energy Ltd (AX:BPT) shed 4.27% or 0.075 points to 1.680.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 709 to 543 and 427 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 0.13% to 11.885.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for August delivery was up 0.02% or 0.20 to $1270.70 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in August rose 1.13% or 0.74 to hit $66.28 a barrel, while the August Brent oil contract rose 1.14% or 0.83 to trade at $73.88 a barrel.
AUD/USD was up 0.27% to 0.7398, while AUD/JPY rose 0.26% to 81.36.
The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.18% at 94.37.