Australia stocks higher at close of trade; S&P/ASX 200 up 0.43%

Investing.com – Australia stocks were higher after the close on Thursday, as gains in the , and sectors led shares higher.

At the close in Sydney, the gained 0.43%.

The best performers of the session on the were Appen Ltd (ASX:), which rose 6.90% or 0.14 points to trade at 2.17 at the close. Meanwhile, Mineral Resources Ltd (ASX:) added 6.76% or 3.24 points to end at 51.18 and St Barbara Ltd (ASX:) was up 4.48% or 0.02 points to 0.35 in late trade.

The worst performers of the session were Fletcher Building Ltd (ASX:), which fell 2.43% or 0.07 points to trade at 2.81 at the close. Nanosonics Ltd (ASX:) declined 1.64% or 0.06 points to end at 3.59 and Ansell Ltd (ASX:) was down 2.20% or 0.72 points to 32.04.

Rising stocks outnumbered declining ones on the Sydney Stock Exchange by 619 to 474 and 453 ended unchanged.

The , which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was down 2.63% to 11.58.

Gold Futures for December delivery was up 0.22% or 5.80 to $2,631.80 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in November rose 0.85% or 0.62 to hit $73.86 a barrel, while the December Brent oil contract rose 0.80% or 0.61 to trade at $77.19 a barrel.

AUD/USD was unchanged 0.28% to 0.67, while AUD/JPY rose 0.26% to 100.57.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.01% at 102.69.