Investing.com – U.K. equities were lower at the close on Wednesday, as losses in the Construction & Materials, Automobiles & Parts and Industrial Metals & Mining sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in London, the FTSE 100 fell 1.20%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the FTSE 100 were Weir Group (LONDON:WEIR), which rose 5.64% or 98.00 points to trade at 1836.00 at the close. Next Plc (LONDON:NXT) added 1.68% or 120.00 points to end at 7285.00 and Royal Mail (LONDON:RMG) was up 1.51% or 6.60 points to 444.20 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Hikma Pharmaceuticals (LONDON:HIK), which lost 3.73% or 79.00 points to trade at 2042.00 in late trade. CRH (LONDON:CRH) declined 3.65% or 69.00 points to end at 1823.00 and Dixons Carphone (LONDON:DC) shed 3.03% or 13.10 points to 418.90.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 1910 to 680 and 482 ended unchanged on the London Stock Exchange.
In commodities trading, Gold for June delivery was down 0.30% or 3.70 to $1210.20 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in June rose 3.00% or 1.71 to hit $58.77 a barrel, while the June Brent oil contract rose 2.41% or 1.55 to trade at $66.19 a barrel.
GBP/USD was up 0.98% to 1.5490, while EUR/GBP rose 0.81% to 0.7216.
The US Dollar Index was down 1.42% at 94.83.