Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Monday, as losses in the Telecoms Services, Healthcare and Consumer Discretionary sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.55%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Beach Energy Ltd (AX:BPT), which rose 8.47% or 0.053 points to trade at 0.672 at the close. G8 Education Ltd (AX:GEM) added 8.45% or 0.315 points to end at 4.045 and Fortescue Metals Group Ltd (AX:FMG) was up 6.55% or 0.360 points to 5.860 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Bluescope Steel Ltd (AX:BSL), which lost 21.83% or 3.080 points to trade at 11.030 in late trade. Vocus Group Ltd (AX:VOC) declined 16.46% or 0.530 points to end at 2.690 and Speedcast International Ltd (AX:SDA) shed 4.17% or 0.145 points to 3.335.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 687 to 482 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 6.36% to 14.935.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for December delivery was down 0.09% or 1.11 to $1290.49 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in October fell 0.14% or 0.07 to hit $48.59 a barrel, while the October Brent oil contract fell 0.27% or 0.14 to trade at $52.58 a barrel.
AUD/USD was down 0.14% to 0.7920, while AUD/JPY fell 0.07% to 86.53.
The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.12% at 93.47.