Australia shares higher at close of trade; S&P/ASX 200 up 0.84%

Investing.com – Australia equities were higher at the close on Friday, as gains in the Gold, IT and Consumer Discretionary sectors propelled shares higher.

At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 added 0.84%.

The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Appen Ltd (ASX:APX), which rose 14.55% or 0.31 points to trade at 2.44 at the close. Pointsbet Holdings Ltd (ASX:PBH) added 5.99% or 0.05 points to end at 0.89 and Zip Co Ltd (ASX:ZIP) was up 4.50% or 0.14 points to 3.25 in late trade.

Biggest losers included Worley Ltd (ASX:WOR), which lost 4.15% or 0.63 points to trade at 14.55 in late trade. Domain Holdings Australia Ltd (ASX:DHG) declined 3.25% or 0.09 points to end at 2.68 and Bluescope Steel Ltd (ASX:BSL) shed 2.92% or 0.67 points to 22.26.

Advancing stocks outnumbered falling ones by 683 to 410 and 483 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 46.96% to 11.18.

In commodities trading, Gold Futures for December delivery was down 0.11% or 3.00 to $2,702.80 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in December fell 0.58% or 0.42 to hit $71.94 a barrel, while the January Brent oil contract fell 0.44% or 0.33 to trade at $75.30 a barrel.

AUD/USD was unchanged 0.40% to 0.67, while AUD/JPY fell 0.47% to 101.67.

The US Dollar Index Futures was unchanged 0.00% at 104.37.