Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Friday, as losses in the Utilities, Real Estate Investment and Consumer Discretionary sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 lost 0.87%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Perpetual Ltd (ASX:PPT), which rose 4.63% or 0.91 points to trade at 20.56 at the close. Westgold Resources Ltd (ASX:WGX) added 4.36% or 0.13 points to end at 3.11 and Idp Education Ltd (ASX:IEL) was up 2.60% or 0.35 points to 13.82 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Flight Centre Ltd (ASX:FLT), which lost 19.94% or 4.31 points to trade at 17.31 in late trade. Corporate Travel Managment Ltd (ASX:CTD) declined 9.35% or 1.17 points to end at 11.35 and Omni Bridgeway Ltd (ASX:OBL) shed 7.55% or 0.08 points to 0.98.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 629 to 439 and 395 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 1.48% to 12.38.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for December delivery was up 0.71% or 19.10 to $2,726.60 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in November rose 0.51% or 0.36 to hit $71.03 a barrel, while the December Brent oil contract rose 0.40% or 0.30 to trade at $74.75 a barrel.
AUD/USD was unchanged 0.08% to 0.67, while AUD/JPY fell 0.20% to 100.39.
The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.14% at 103.50.