Australia stocks lower at close of trade; S&P/ASX 200 down 1.24%

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

At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 fell 1.24% to hit a new 3-months low.

The best performers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Codan Ltd (ASX:CDA), which rose 3.45% or 0.54 points to trade at 16.18 at the close. Meanwhile, Pointsbet Holdings Ltd (ASX:PBH) added 2.50% or 0.03 points to end at 1.02 and AGL Energy Ltd (ASX:AGL) was up 2.23% or 0.24 points to 10.98 in late trade.

The worst performers of the session were Mesoblast Ltd (ASX:MSB), which fell 20.66% or 0.63 points to trade at 2.42 at the close. Wesfarmers Ltd (ASX:WES) declined 5.00% or 3.66 points to end at 69.56 and Seek Ltd (ASX:SEK) was down 4.57% or 1.07 points to 22.34.

Falling stocks outnumbered advancing ones on the Sydney Stock Exchange by 599 to 449 and 458 ended unchanged.

The S&P/ASX 200 VIX, which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was down 0.87% to 11.70.

Gold Futures for February delivery was up 0.17% or 4.51 to $2,612.61 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in January fell 0.40% or 0.28 to hit $68.95 a barrel, while the February Brent oil contract fell 0.63% or 0.46 to trade at $72.42 a barrel.

AUD/USD was unchanged 0.21% to 0.62, while AUD/JPY fell 0.38% to 97.80.

The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.04% at 108.20.