Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Friday, as losses in the Real Estate Investment, Industrials and Energy sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.40%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Asaleo Care (AX:AHY), which rose 7.97% or 0.110 points to trade at 1.490 at the close. Altium Ltd (AX:ALU) added 5.62% or 0.500 points to end at 9.400 and St Barbara Ltd (AX:SBM) was up 5.46% or 0.160 points to 3.090 in late trade.
Biggest losers included BWP Trust (AX:BWP), which lost 7.16% or 0.255 points to trade at 3.305 in late trade. Select Harvests Ltd (AX:SHV) declined 6.69% or 0.450 points to end at 6.280 and Aconex Ltd (AX:ACX) shed 5.99% or 0.415 points to 6.515.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 586 to 494 and 328 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 2.37% to 12.865.
In commodities trading, Gold for December delivery was up 0.18% or 2.35 to $1327.45 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in October fell 0.25% or 0.12 to hit $47.26 a barrel, while the October Brent oil contract fell 0.28% or 0.14 to trade at $49.53 a barrel.
AUD/USD was up 0.29% to 0.7640, while AUD/JPY rose 0.17% to 76.71.
The US Dollar Index was down 0.10% at 94.59.