Australia shares lower at close of trade; S&P/ASX 200 down 0.19%

Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Thursday, as losses in the Metals & Mining , Materials and Resources sectors propelled shares lower.

At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 0.19%.

The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Automotive Group Holdings Ltd (AX: AHG ), which rose 4.14% or 0.065 points to trade at 1.635 at the close. Charter Hall Group (AX: CHC ) added 4.02% or 0.280 points to end at 7.250 and Northern Star Resources Ltd (AX: NST ) was up 3.93% or 0.310 points to 8.200 in late trade.

Biggest losers included Afterpay Touch Group Ltd (AX: APT ), which lost 5.33% or 0.730 points to trade at 12.960 in late trade. Seek Ltd (AX: SEK ) declined 4.71% or 0.860 points to end at 17.380 and G8 Education Ltd (AX: GEM ) shed 4.64% or 0.140 points to 2.880.

Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 631 to 428 and 380 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 9.32% to 17.137.

In commodities trading, Gold Futures for February delivery was up 0.21% or 2.65 to $1245.25 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in January fell 0.96% or 0.51 to hit $52.38 a barrel, while the February Brent oil contract fell 0.75% or 0.46 to trade at $61.10 a barrel.

AUD/USD was down 0.54% to 0.7231, while AUD/JPY fell 0.91% to 81.53.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.04% at 96.975.