Investing.com – U.K. equities were lower at the close on Thursday, as losses in the Banking, Oil & Gas Producers and Life Insurance/Assurance sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in London, the Investing.com United Kingdom 100 declined 2.35% to hit a new 1-month low.
The biggest gainers of the session on the Investing.com United Kingdom 100 were BAE Systems PLC (LON:BAES), which rose 5.89% or 28.10 points to trade at 505.00 at the close. Rentokil Initial PLC (LON:RTO) added 1.68% or 9.20 points to end at 557.60 and AstraZeneca PLC (LON:AZN) was up 1.58% or 136.0 points to 8751.0 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Lloyds Banking Group PLC (LON:LLOY), which lost 7.62% or 2.16 points to trade at 26.20 in late trade. Standard Chartered PLC (LON:STAN) declined 6.23% or 26.20 points to end at 394.10 and Legal & General Group PLC (LON:LGEN) shed 6.09% or 13.70 points to 211.20.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 1697 to 501 and 104 ended unchanged on the London Stock Exchange.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for August delivery was down 0.60% or 11.70 to $1941.70 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in September fell 2.45% or 1.01 to hit $40.26 a barrel, while the October Brent oil contract fell 1.63% or 0.72 to trade at $43.37 a barrel.
GBP/USD was up 0.64% to 1.3078, while EUR/GBP fell 0.37% to 0.9037.
The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.39% at 93.065.