Australia stocks were lower after the close on Thursday, as losses in the Healthcare, Energy and Telecoms Services sectors led shares lower.
At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.27%.
The best performers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Service Stream Ltd (ASX:SSM), which rose 11.07% or 0.270 points to trade at 2.710 at the close. Meanwhile, Northern Star Resources Ltd (ASX:NST) added 4.71% or 0.470 points to end at 10.440 and Avita Medical (ASX:AVH) was up 4.10% or 0.025 points to 0.635 in late trade.
The worst performers of the session were Jumbo Interactive Ltd (ASX:JIN), which fell 4.96% or 0.960 points to trade at 18.410 at the close. Beach Energy Ltd (ASX:BPT) declined 4.83% or 0.130 points to end at 2.560 and Appen Ltd (ASX:APX) was down 4.57% or 1.100 points to 22.980.
Falling stocks outnumbered advancing ones on the Sydney Stock Exchange by 564 to 556 and 340 ended unchanged.
The S&P/ASX 200 VIX, which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was down 4.32% to 10.883.
Gold Futures for February delivery was up 0.15% or 2.15 to $1480.85 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in February rose 0.02% or 0.01 to hit $60.86 a barrel, while the February Brent oil contract rose 0.08% or 0.05 to trade at $66.22 a barrel.
AUD/USD was up 0.45% to 0.6883, while AUD/JPY rose 0.49% to 75.42.
The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.08% at 96.885.
