Investing.com – Australia equities were higher at the close on Friday, as gains in the Gold, Real Estate Investment and Consumer Discretionary sectors propelled shares higher.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 added 0.88% to hit a new all time high.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Appen Ltd (ASX:APX), which rose 8.60% or 0.04 points to trade at 0.51 at the close. Mesoblast Ltd (ASX:MSB) added 7.69% or 0.09 points to end at 1.19 and Cromwell Property Group (ASX:CMW) was up 6.33% or 0.03 points to 0.42 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Computershare Ltd. (ASX:CPU), which lost 3.85% or 1.05 points to trade at 26.20 in late trade. Wisetech Global Ltd (ASX:WTC) declined 3.73% or 3.68 points to end at 94.91 and Alumina Ltd (ASX:AWC) shed 2.67% or 0.05 points to 1.64.
Advancing stocks outnumbered falling ones by 708 to 410 and 446 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 2.70% to 11.65.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for August delivery was down 0.47% or 11.45 to $2,410.45 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in August rose 0.70% or 0.58 to hit $83.20 a barrel, while the September Brent oil contract rose 0.59% or 0.50 to trade at $85.90 a barrel.
AUD/USD was unchanged 0.10% to 0.68, while AUD/JPY rose 0.31% to 107.69.
The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.06% at 104.19.