Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Monday, as losses in the Energy, Consumer Discretionary and Consumer Staples sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 0.38%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Perpetual Ltd (AX:PPT), which rose 12.27% or 4.720 points to trade at 43.200 at the close. St Barbara Ltd (AX:SBM) added 7.43% or 0.310 points to end at 4.480 and Resolute Mining Ltd (AX:RSG) was up 5.86% or 0.065 points to 1.175 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Bingo Industries Ltd (AX:BIN), which lost 4.97% or 0.080 points to trade at 1.530 in late trade. Worleyparsons Ltd (AX:WOR) declined 4.18% or 0.600 points to end at 13.770 and Infigen Energy Ltd (AX:IFN) shed 4.00% or 0.020 points to 0.480.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 664 to 443 and 376 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 0.51% to 13.249.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for April delivery was down 0.09% or 1.15 to $1298.15 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in April rose 0.50% or 0.28 to hit $56.35 a barrel, while the May Brent oil contract rose 0.32% or 0.21 to trade at $65.95 a barrel.
AUD/USD was down 0.08% to 0.7039, while AUD/JPY rose 0.07% to 78.22.
The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.09% at 97.352.