Australia stocks higher at close of trade; S&P/ASX 200 up 0.13%

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 rose 0.13% to hit a new 6-months high.

The best performers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Megaport Ltd (ASX:MP1), which rose 11.11% or 0.62 points to trade at 6.20 at the close. Meanwhile, Pointsbet Holdings Ltd (ASX:PBH) added 7.51% or 0.11 points to end at 1.57 and Xero Ltd (ASX:XRO) was up 7.47% or 5.74 points to 82.60 in late trade.

The worst performers of the session were Qbe Insurance Group Ltd (ASX:QBE), which fell 4.76% or 0.66 points to trade at 13.20 at the close. Computershare Ltd. (ASX:CPU) declined 3.63% or 0.87 points to end at 23.13 and Virgin Money PLC (ASX:VUK) was down 3.58% or 0.12 points to 3.23.

Rising stocks outnumbered declining ones on the Sydney Stock Exchange by 729 to 626 and 372 ended unchanged.

The S&P/ASX 200 VIX, which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was down 6.19% to 11.82.

Gold Futures for April delivery was up 1.45% or 28.10 to $1,970.90 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in March rose 0.42% or 0.32 to hit $76.73 a barrel, while the April Brent oil contract rose 0.35% or 0.29 to trade at $83.13 a barrel.

AUD/USD was unchanged 0.06% to 0.71, while AUD/JPY fell 0.16% to 91.84.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.14% at 100.88.