Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Friday, as losses in the Metals & Mining, Materials and Resources sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.28%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Altium Ltd (AX:ALU), which rose 2.84% or 0.220 points to trade at 7.980 at the close. Virtus Health Ltd (AX:VRT) added 2.49% or 0.150 points to end at 6.170 and Scentre (AX:SCG) was up 2.01% or 0.090 points to 4.560 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Fortescue Metals Group Ltd (AX:FMG), which lost 4.47% or 0.270 points to trade at 5.770 in late trade. Estia Health Ltd (AX:EHE) declined 3.21% or 0.080 points to end at 2.410 and Tatts Group Ltd (AX:TTS) shed 3.08% or 0.140 points to 4.410.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 428 to 428 and 337 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 3.19% to 10.543.
In commodities trading, Gold for February delivery was up 0.15% or 1.75 to $1132.45 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in February fell 0.43% or 0.23 to hit $52.72 a barrel, while the February Brent oil contract fell 0.33% or 0.18 to trade at $54.87 a barrel.
AUD/USD was down 0.26% to 0.7199, while AUD/JPY fell 0.35% to 84.53.
The US Dollar Index was down 0.09% at 102.98.