Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Friday, as losses in the Consumer Discretionary, IT and Industrials sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.78%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Alumina Ltd (AX:AWC), which rose 5.23% or 0.093 points to trade at 1.863 at the close. Iluka Resources Ltd (AX:ILU) added 3.58% or 0.290 points to end at 8.400 and Aveo Group (AX:AOG) was up 2.97% or 0.095 points to 3.295 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Syrah Resources Ltd (AX:SYR), which lost 6.68% or 0.195 points to trade at 2.725 in late trade. Bapcor Ltd (AX:BAP) declined 5.47% or 0.300 points to end at 5.180 and A2 Milk Company Ltd (AX:A2M) shed 4.66% or 0.160 points to 3.270.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 638 to 412 and 390 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 2.14% to 11.977.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for June delivery was up 0.22% or 2.72 to $1226.92 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in June rose 0.17% or 0.08 to hit $47.91 a barrel, while the July Brent oil contract rose 0.12% or 0.06 to trade at $50.83 a barrel.
AUD/USD was up 0.09% to 0.7385, while AUD/JPY unchanged 0.00% to 84.02.
The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.06% at 99.47.