Australia stocks lower at close of trade; S&P/ASX 200 down 0.52%

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At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 0.52%.

The best performers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Megaport Ltd (ASX:MP1), which rose 14.03% or 0.77 points to trade at 6.26 at the close. Meanwhile, Zip Co Ltd (ASX:ZIP) added 12.75% or 0.07 points to end at 0.57 and EML Payments Ltd (ASX:EML) was up 10.51% or 0.14 points to 1.42 in late trade.

The worst performers of the session were St Barbara Ltd (ASX:SBM), which fell 9.50% or 0.09 points to trade at 0.81 at the close. Westgold Resources Ltd (ASX:WGX) declined 9.30% or 0.12 points to end at 1.17 and Champion Iron Ltd (ASX:CIA) was down 8.65% or 0.45 points to 4.75.

Falling stocks outnumbered advancing ones on the Sydney Stock Exchange by 720 to 641 and 334 ended unchanged.

The S&P/ASX 200 VIX, which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was up 0.14% to 18.82.

Gold Futures for August delivery was up 0.20% or 3.45 to $1,767.35 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in August rose 1.56% or 1.55 to hit $101.05 a barrel, while the September Brent oil contract rose 2.06% or 2.12 to trade at $104.89 a barrel.

AUD/USD was unchanged 0.10% to 0.68, while AUD/JPY fell 0.10% to 92.32.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.04% at 106.27.