Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Tuesday, as losses in the Consumer Discretionary, Telecoms Services and Utilities sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 lost 0.12%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Beach Energy Ltd (AX:BPT), which rose 4.50% or 0.025 points to trade at 0.580 at the close. Orora Fpo (AX:ORA) added 3.96% or 0.120 points to end at 3.150 and Aconex Ltd (AX:ACX) was up 3.86% or 0.300 points to 8.080 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Mesoblast Ltd (AX:MSB), which lost 16.71% or 0.300 points to trade at 1.495 in late trade. G8 Education Ltd (AX:GEM) declined 11.25% or 0.415 points to end at 3.275 and Genworth Fp (AX:GMA) shed 6.36% or 0.200 points to 2.945.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 565 to 502 and 334 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 down 1.90% to 12.443.
In commodities trading, Gold for December delivery was up 0.65% or 8.75 to $1353.35 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in September fell 0.50% or 0.23 to hit $45.48 a barrel, while the October Brent oil contract fell 0.62% or 0.30 to trade at $48.05 a barrel.
AUD/USD was up 0.30% to 0.7696, while AUD/JPY fell 0.71% to 77.15.
The US Dollar Index was down 0.37% at 95.23.