Australia shares lower at close of trade; S&P/ASX 200 down 1.93%

Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Tuesday, as losses in the Energy , Healthcare and IT sectors propelled shares lower.

At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 lost 1.93% to hit a new 1-month low.

The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Metcash Ltd (AX: MTS ), which rose 6.22% or 0.130 points to trade at 2.220 at the close. Independence Group NL (AX: IGO ) added 4.89% or 0.160 points to end at 3.430 and Regis Resources Ltd (AX: RRL ) was up 4.37% or 0.145 points to 3.465 in late trade.

Biggest losers included Mesoblast Ltd (AX: MSB ), which lost 35.68% or 0.685 points to trade at 1.235 in late trade. Liquefied Natural Gas Ltd (AX: LNG ) declined 11.14% or 0.093 points to end at 0.738 and Beach Energy Ltd (AX: BPT ) shed 7.34% or 0.053 points to 0.662.

Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 778 to 302 and 352 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 25.88% to 20.495 a new 3-month high.

In commodities trading, Gold for August delivery was down 0.33% or 4.25 to $1282.65 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in July fell 0.88% or 0.43 to hit $48.45 a barrel, while the August Brent oil contract fell 0.73% or 0.37 to trade at $49.98 a barrel.

AUD/USD was up 0.16% to 0.7400, while AUD/JPY fell 0.10% to 78.40.

The US Dollar Index was up 0.10% at 94.51.