Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Thursday, as losses in the Gold, IT and Materials sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 1.70% to hit a new 1-month low.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Mesoblast Ltd (ASX:MSB), which rose 54.04% or 1.07 points to trade at 3.05 at the close. Credit Corp Group Ltd (ASX:CCP) added 7.65% or 1.16 points to end at 16.33 and Insignia Financial Ltd (ASX:IFL) was up 4.35% or 0.15 points to 3.60 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Megaport Ltd (ASX:MP1), which lost 10.56% or 0.88 points to trade at 7.45 in late trade. Zip Co Ltd (ASX:ZIP) declined 8.97% or 0.28 points to end at 2.84 and Westgold Resources Ltd (ASX:WGX) shed 8.33% or 0.27 points to 2.97.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 829 to 301 and 418 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 20.76% to 11.81 a new 1-month high.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for February delivery was down 1.19% or 31.66 to $2,621.64 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in January fell 1.49% or 1.05 to hit $69.53 a barrel, while the February Brent oil contract fell 0.57% or 0.42 to trade at $72.97 a barrel.
AUD/USD was unchanged 0.05% to 0.62, while AUD/JPY rose 0.42% to 96.64.
The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.07% at 107.82.