Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Thursday, as losses in the Gold, Utilities and Real Estate Investment sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 1.42% to hit a new 3-month low.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Magellan Financial Group Ltd (ASX:MFG), which rose 2.59% or 0.460 points to trade at 18.250 at the close. Fisher & Paykel Healthcare Ltd (ASX:FPH) added 2.57% or 0.160 points to end at 6.390 and Harvey Norman Holdings Ltd (ASX:HVN) was up 2.27% or 0.100 points to 4.500 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Metcash Ltd (ASX:MTS), which lost 17.69% or 0.245 points to trade at 1.140 in late trade. Syrah Res F (ASX:SYR) declined 10.00% or 0.410 points to end at 3.690 and Qube Holdings Ltd (ASX:QUB) shed 7.58% or 0.210 points to 2.560.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 619 to 390 and 181 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 7.98% to 18.579.
In commodities trading, Gold for August delivery was down 0.29% or 3.40 to $1181.50 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in July fell 0.36% or 0.21 to hit $59.42 a barrel, while the July Brent oil contract fell 0.12% or 0.07 to trade at $63.73 a barrel.
AUD/USD was down 0.86% to 0.7719, while AUD/JPY fell 0.85% to 95.91.
The US Dollar Index was up 0.23% at 95.56.