Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Wednesday, as losses in the IT, Utilities and Healthcare sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 lost 0.30%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Monadelphous Group Ltd (AX:MND), which rose 8.36% or 1.210 points to trade at 15.690 at the close. A2 Milk Company Ltd (AX:A2M) added 6.78% or 0.305 points to end at 4.805 and Virtus Health Ltd (AX:VRT) was up 6.20% or 0.340 points to 5.820 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Healthscope (AX:HSO), which lost 15.07% or 0.330 points to trade at 1.860 in late trade. Sirtex Medical Ltd (AX:SRX) declined 11.32% or 1.840 points to end at 14.420 and Insurance Australia Group Ltd (AX:IAG) shed 8.14% or 0.550 points to 6.210.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 589 to 525 and 389 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 down 1.22% to 13.493.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for December delivery was down 0.02% or 0.22 to $1290.78 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in October fell 0.23% or 0.11 to hit $47.72 a barrel, while the October Brent oil contract fell 0.27% or 0.14 to trade at $51.73 a barrel.
AUD/USD was down 0.27% to 0.7891, while AUD/JPY fell 0.36% to 86.38.
The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.04% at 93.46.