Investing.com – France equities were lower at the close on Thursday, as losses in the Electronic Equipment, Industrial Engineering and Foods & Drugs sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Paris, the CAC 40 declined 0.57%, while the SBF 120 index lost 0.58%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the CAC 40 were Renault SA (PARIS:RENA), which rose 2.94% or 2.63 points to trade at 92.22 at the close. Lafarge (PARIS:LAFP) added 2.41% or 1.52 points to end at 64.72 and Airbus Group (PARIS:AIR) was up 1.98% or 1.24 points to 63.97 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Credit Agricole (PARIS:CAGR), which lost 2.99% or 0.425 points to trade at 13.790 in late trade. Arcelormittal (AMS:ISPA) declined 2.59% or 0.24 points to end at 9.20 and Alstom (PARIS:ALSO) shed 2.34% or 0.70 points to 29.24.
The top performers on the SBF 120 were Genfit (PARIS:GNFT) which rose 7.92% to 39.315, Virbac (PARIS:VIRB) which was up 7.16% to settle at 233.60 and Faurecia (PARIS:EPED) which gained 3.13% to close at 44.10.
The worst performers were Casino Guichard (PARIS:CASP) which was down 4.60% to 82.62 in late trade, Rexel (PARIS:RXL) which lost 4.57% to settle at 17.23 and Technicolor (PARIS:TCH) which was down 3.22% to 6.254 at the close.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 516 to 391 and 49 ended unchanged on the Paris Stock Exchange.
The CAC 40 VIX, which measures the implied volatility of CAC 40 options, was up 8.33% to 18.73.
In commodities trading, Gold for June delivery was down 0.39% or 4.70 to $1196.60 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in May fell 0.69% or 0.39 to hit $56.00 a barrel, while the June Brent oil contract fell 0.36% or 0.23 to trade at $63.09 a barrel.
EUR/USD was up 0.45% to 1.0730, while EUR/GBP fell 0.01% to 0.7194.
The US Dollar Index was down 0.43% at 98.12.