Australia stocks higher at close of trade; S&P/ASX 200 up 0.28%

Investing.com – Australia stocks were higher after the close on Monday, as gains in the A-REITs, Healthcare and Consumer Discretionary sectors led shares higher.

At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 rose 0.28% to hit a new all time high.

The best performers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Appen Ltd (ASX:APX), which rose 12.44% or 0.26 points to trade at 2.35 at the close. Meanwhile, Mesoblast Ltd (ASX:MSB) added 11.63% or 0.18 points to end at 1.68 and Zip Co Ltd (ASX:ZIP) was up 4.36% or 0.14 points to 3.35 in late trade.

The worst performers of the session were Nanosonics Ltd (ASX:NAN), which fell 6.94% or 0.24 points to trade at 3.22 at the close. Tabcorp Holdings Ltd (ASX:TAH) declined 5.61% or 0.03 points to end at 0.51 and Resolute Mining Ltd (ASX:RSG) was down 1.23% or 0.01 points to 0.40.

Rising stocks outnumbered declining ones on the Sydney Stock Exchange by 572 to 559 and 446 ended unchanged.

The S&P/ASX 200 VIX, which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was down 0.79% to 11.00.

Gold Futures for February delivery was down 1.55% or 42.35 to $2,694.85 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in January fell 0.72% or 0.51 to hit $70.73 a barrel, while the February Brent oil contract fell 0.70% or 0.52 to trade at $74.11 a barrel.

AUD/USD was unchanged 0.28% to 0.65, while AUD/JPY fell 0.28% to 100.56.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.53% at 106.93.