Investing.com – Australia stocks were lower after the close on Thursday, as losses in the Consumer Discretionary, A-REITs and Telecoms Services sectors led shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 0.92%.
The best performers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Perenti Global Ltd (ASX:PRN), which rose 4.30% or 0.060 points to trade at 1.455 at the close. Meanwhile, Austal Ltd (ASX:ASB) added 3.70% or 0.12 points to end at 3.36 and Qbe Insurance Group Ltd (ASX:QBE) was up 3.61% or 0.310 points to 8.890 in late trade.
The worst performers of the session were Vocus Group Ltd (ASX:VOC), which fell 6.25% or 0.20 points to trade at 3.00 at the close. CSR Ltd (ASX:CSR) declined 5.37% or 0.210 points to end at 3.700 and Polynovo Ltd (ASX:PNV) was down 5.30% or 0.140 points to 2.500.
Falling stocks outnumbered advancing ones on the Sydney Stock Exchange by 713 to 459 and 391 ended unchanged.
The S&P/ASX 200 VIX, which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was up 6.96% to 23.999.
Gold Futures for August delivery was down 0.05% or 0.80 to $1734.80 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in July fell 0.58% or 0.22 to hit $37.74 a barrel, while the August Brent oil contract fell 0.22% or 0.09 to trade at $40.62 a barrel.
AUD/USD was down 0.08% to 0.6877, while AUD/JPY fell 0.16% to 73.53.
The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.16% at 96.987.