Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Tuesday, as losses in the Consumer Discretionary, Consumer Staples and Financials sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 1.09%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were APN Outdoor Group Ltd (AX:APO), which rose 4.61% or 0.320 points to trade at 7.260 at the close. Whitehaven Coal Ltd (AX:WHC) added 4.49% or 0.053 points to end at 1.222 and Western Areas Ltd (AX:WSA) was up 3.97% or 0.095 points to 2.485 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Mantra Group Ltd (AX:MTR), which lost 8.09% or 0.275 points to trade at 3.125 in late trade. Metcash Ltd (AX:MTS) declined 4.75% or 0.095 points to end at 1.905 and Harvey Norman Holdings Ltd (AX:HVN) shed 4.60% or 0.210 points to 4.360.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 610 to 454 and 295 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 2.15% to 18.917.
In commodities trading, Gold for August delivery was up 0.45% or 6.00 to $1345.00 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in August fell 1.76% or 0.86 to hit $48.13 a barrel, while the September Brent oil contract fell 1.12% or 0.56 to trade at $49.54 a barrel.
AUD/USD was down 0.32% to 0.7516, while AUD/JPY fell 0.74% to 76.77.
The US Dollar Index was up 0.10% at 95.71.