Australia stocks lower at close of trade; S&P/ASX 200 down 0.06%

Investing.com – Australia stocks were lower after the close on Wednesday, as losses in the Financials, Consumer Discretionary and Gold sectors led shares lower.

At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 0.06%.

The best performers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Omni Bridgeway Ltd (ASX:OBL), which rose 49.48% or 0.48 points to trade at 1.45 at the close. Meanwhile, Cromwell Property Group (ASX:CMW) added 12.16% or 0.05 points to end at 0.41 and Kogan.com Ltd (ASX:KGN) was up 9.11% or 0.51 points to 6.11 in late trade.

The worst performers of the session were Insignia Financial Ltd (ASX:IFL), which fell 4.17% or 0.15 points to trade at 3.45 at the close. Nickel Mines Ltd (ASX:NIC) declined 3.51% or 0.03 points to end at 0.82 and St Barbara Ltd (ASX:SBM) was down 1.61% or 0.01 points to 0.31.

Falling stocks outnumbered advancing ones on the Sydney Stock Exchange by 566 to 531 and 461 ended unchanged.

The S&P/ASX 200 VIX, which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was down 3.91% to 9.77 a new 1-month low.

Gold Futures for February delivery was up 0.06% or 1.55 to $2,663.55 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in January fell 0.51% or 0.36 to hit $69.72 a barrel, while the February Brent oil contract rose 0.11% or 0.08 to trade at $73.27 a barrel.

AUD/USD was unchanged 0.34% to 0.63, while AUD/JPY fell 0.39% to 96.88.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.04% at 106.62.