Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Friday, as losses in the Consumer Discretionary, Metals & Mining and Resources sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 1.31%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Aconex Ltd (AX:ACX), which rose 4.44% or 0.190 points to trade at 4.470 at the close. Northern Star Resources Ltd (AX:NST) added 2.92% or 0.140 points to end at 4.930 and Evolution Mining Ltd (AX:EVN) was up 2.18% or 0.050 points to 2.340 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Sigma Pharmaceuticals Ltd (AX:SIG), which lost 7.26% or 0.068 points to trade at 0.863 in late trade. Australian Agricultural Company Ltd (AX:AAC) declined 6.84% or 0.113 points to end at 1.532 and Tabcorp Holdings Ltd (AX:TAH) shed 5.76% or 0.240 points to 3.930.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 783 to 364 and 328 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 26.63% to 17.607 a new 6-month high.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for December delivery was up 0.08% or 1.01 to $1291.11 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in September fell 0.80% or 0.39 to hit $48.20 a barrel, while the October Brent oil contract fell 0.85% or 0.44 to trade at $51.46 a barrel.
AUD/USD was down 0.18% to 0.7861, while AUD/JPY fell 0.23% to 85.80.
The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.02% at 93.32.