Australia stocks lower at close of trade; S&P/ASX 200 down 1.06%

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

At the close in Sydney, the fell 1.06%.

The best performers of the session on the were AUB Group Ltd (ASX:), which rose 3.85% or 1.15 points to trade at 31.02 at the close. Meanwhile, AGL Energy Ltd (ASX:) added 2.37% or 0.24 points to end at 10.37 and Beach Energy Ltd (ASX:) was up 2.21% or 0.04 points to 1.62 in late trade.

The worst performers of the session were Westpac Banking Corp (ASX:), which fell 5.74% or 1.60 points to trade at 26.29 at the close. Super Retail Group Ltd (ASX:) declined 5.16% or 0.71 points to end at 13.06 and JB Hi-Fi Ltd (ASX:) was down 4.54% or 2.72 points to 57.25.

Falling stocks outnumbered advancing ones on the Sydney Stock Exchange by 760 to 385 and 443 ended unchanged.

The , which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was up 2.29% to 11.38.

Gold Futures for June delivery was up 0.04% or 1.00 to $2,323.30 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in June rose 0.44% or 0.35 to hit $79.34 a barrel, while the July Brent oil contract rose 0.31% or 0.26 to trade at $83.84 a barrel.

AUD/USD was unchanged 0.08% to 0.66, while AUD/JPY fell 0.01% to 102.33.

The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.06% at 105.49.