Australia stocks were higher after the close on Friday, as gains in the IT, Financials and Telecoms Services sectors led shares higher.

At the close in Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 gained 0.59%.

The best performers of the session on the S&P/ASX 200 were Austal Ltd (ASX:ASB), which rose 26.02% or 0.41 points to trade at 2.01 at the close. Meanwhile, EML Payments Ltd (ASX:EML) added 6.25% or 0.04 points to end at 0.68 and AUB Group Ltd (ASX:AUB) was up 5.88% or 1.52 points to 27.38 in late trade.

The worst performers of the session were Nufarm Ltd (ASX:NUF), which fell 4.63% or 0.28 points to trade at 5.77 at the close. Whitehaven Coal Ltd (ASX:WHC) declined 4.32% or 0.31 points to end at 6.86 and Omni Bridgeway Ltd (ASX:OBL) was down 3.20% or 0.09 points to 2.72.

Rising stocks outnumbered declining ones on the Sydney Stock Exchange by 723 to 537 and 433 ended unchanged.

The S&P/ASX 200 VIX, which measures the implied volatility of S&P/ASX 200 options, was up 1.47% to 11.90.

Gold Futures for June delivery was up 0.49% or 9.55 to $1,969.35 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in June rose 0.58% or 0.42 to hit $72.28 a barrel, while the July Brent oil contract rose 0.65% or 0.49 to trade at $76.35 a barrel.

AUD/USD was unchanged 0.39% to 0.66, while AUD/JPY fell 0.08% to 91.78.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.15% at 103.29.