Australia shares lower at close of trade; S&P/ASX 200 down 0.30%

Investing.com – Australia equities were lower at the close on Wednesday, as losses in the Financials, Energy and IT sectors propelled shares lower.

At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 lost 0.30%.

The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Mineral Resources Ltd (ASX:MIN), which rose 16.47% or 4.99 points to trade at 35.28 at the close. Pilbara Minerals Ltd (ASX:PLS) added 13.77% or 0.32 points to end at 2.68 and Pointsbet Holdings Ltd (ASX:PBH) was up 11.82% or 0.07 points to 0.62 in late trade.

Biggest losers included Nextdc Ltd (ASX:NXT), which lost 5.55% or 0.99 points to trade at 16.85 in late trade. Zip Co Ltd (ASX:ZIP) declined 4.15% or 0.09 points to end at 2.08 and Appen Ltd (ASX:APX) shed 4.10% or 0.06 points to 1.29.

Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 561 to 525 and 395 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 up 1.89% to 12.53.

In commodities trading, Gold Futures for December delivery was up 0.42% or 10.75 to $2,553.85 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in October rose 1.10% or 0.72 to hit $66.47 a barrel, while the November Brent oil contract rose 1.10% or 0.76 to trade at $69.95 a barrel.

AUD/USD was unchanged 0.14% to 0.67, while AUD/JPY fell 0.61% to 94.19.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.22% at 101.37.