Australia shares lower at close of trade; S&P/ASX 200 down 0.13%

Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Thursday, as losses in the Consumer Staples , Healthcare and Gold sectors propelled shares lower.

At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 0.13%.

The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Orocobre Ltd (AX: ORE ), which rose 5.14% or 0.200 points to trade at 4.090 at the close. Iluka Resources Ltd (AX: ILU ) added 4.08% or 0.380 points to end at 9.700 and Sky Network Television Ltd. (AX: SKT ) was up 3.99% or 0.095 points to 2.475 in late trade.

Biggest losers included Healthscope (AX: HSO ), which lost 3.57% or 0.060 points to trade at 1.620 in late trade. Ardent Leisure Group (AX: AAD ) declined 3.23% or 0.060 points to end at 1.800 and Resolute Mining Ltd (AX: RSG ) shed 2.96% or 0.038 points to 1.228.

Advancing stocks outnumbered falling ones by 587 to 571 and 393 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 4.92% to 13.619.

In commodities trading, Gold Futures for December delivery was up 0.19% or 2.50 to $1341.50 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in October fell 0.22% or 0.11 to hit $49.05 a barrel, while the November Brent oil contract fell 0.28% or 0.15 to trade at $54.05 a barrel.

AUD/USD was down 0.14% to 0.7991, while AUD/JPY fell 0.30% to 87.12.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.05% at 92.16.