CANBERRA: Australia stocks were higher after the close on Wednesday, as gains in the Utilities, Consumer Staples and Telecoms Services sectors led shares higher. At the close in Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 rose 0.57%. The best performers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Fairfax Media Ltd (AX:FXJ), which rose 6.18% or 0.053 points to trade at 0.902 at the close. Meanwhile, Mantra Group Ltd (AX:MTR) added 5.17% or 0.140 points to end at 2.850 and Virtus Health Ltd (AX:VRT) was up 4.31% or 0.220 points to 5.330 in late trade. The worst performers of the session were Ansell Ltd (AX:ANN), which fell 5.97% or 1.420 points to trade at 22.360 at the close. Iluka Resources Ltd (AX:ILU) declined 4.24% or 0.320 points to end at 7.220 and Domino’S Pizza Enterprises Ltd (AX:DMP) was down 4.05% or 2.410 points to 57.040.
Rising stocks outnumbered declining ones on the Australia Stock Exchange by 557 to 541 and 311 ended unchanged. The S&P/ASX 200 VIX, which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was down 4.00% to 13.240. Gold Futures for April delivery was down 0.13% or 1.55 to $1209.85 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in March fell 0.19% or 0.10 to hit $52.71 a barrel, while the April Brent oil contract fell 0.31% or 0.17 to trade at $55.41 a barrel. AUD/USD was down 0.26% to 0.7566, while AUD/JPY rose 0.13% to 85.67. The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.15% at 99.68.