Investing.com – Australia stocks were higher after the close on Thursday, as gains in the Gold, Consumer Discretionary and Metals & Mining sectors led shares higher.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 rose 0.06%.
The best performers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Zip Co Ltd (ASX:ZIP), which rose 11.71% or 0.07 points to trade at 0.62 at the close. Meanwhile, St Barbara Ltd (ASX:SBM) added 8.18% or 0.07 points to end at 0.86 and Polynovo Ltd (ASX:PNV) was up 7.43% or 0.15 points to 2.17 in late trade.
The worst performers of the session were Costa Group Holdings Ltd (ASX:CGC), which fell 3.21% or 0.09 points to trade at 2.71 at the close. Beach Energy Ltd (ASX:BPT) declined 2.53% or 0.04 points to end at 1.54 and Computershare Ltd. (ASX:CPU) was down 2.20% or 0.58 points to 25.76.
Rising stocks outnumbered declining ones on the Sydney Stock Exchange by 716 to 471 and 395 ended unchanged.
The S&P/ASX 200 VIX, which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was down 0.89% to 12.98.
Gold Futures for February delivery was down 0.06% or 1.15 to $1,857.85 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in February rose 1.07% or 0.78 to hit $73.62 a barrel, while the March Brent oil contract rose 0.99% or 0.77 to trade at $78.61 a barrel.
AUD/USD was unchanged 0.25% to 0.68, while AUD/JPY fell 0.48% to 90.24.
The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.08% at 104.11.