Australia stocks higher at close of trade; S&P/ASX 200 up 0.15%

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

At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 added 0.15%.

The best performers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Ramelius Resources Ltd (ASX:RMS), which rose 8.06% or 0.17 points to trade at 2.28 at the close. Meanwhile, Kogan.com Ltd (ASX:KGN) added 7.50% or 0.38 points to end at 5.45 and Perseus Mining Ltd (ASX:PRU) was up 5.70% or 0.15 points to 2.78 in late trade.

The worst performers of the session were Mesoblast Ltd (ASX:MSB), which fell 6.82% or 0.12 points to trade at 1.64 at the close. Appen Ltd (ASX:APX) declined 5.98% or 0.14 points to end at 2.20 and Pointsbet Holdings Ltd (ASX:PBH) was down 3.81% or 0.04 points to 1.01.

Rising stocks outnumbered declining ones on the Sydney Stock Exchange by 567 to 546 and 376 ended unchanged.

The S&P/ASX 200 VIX, which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was down 2.83% to 10.15.

Gold Futures for February delivery was down 0.13% or 3.38 to $2,672.82 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in January rose 0.03% or 0.02 to hit $68.56 a barrel, while the February Brent oil contract rose 0.03% or 0.02 to trade at $72.33 a barrel.

AUD/USD was unchanged 0.08% to 0.64, while AUD/JPY fell 0.27% to 96.59.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.08% at 106.21.