Investing.com – U.K. stocks were higher after the close on Thursday, as gains in the Forestry & Paper, Healthcare Equipment & Services and Banking sectors led shares higher.
At the close in London, the Investing.com United Kingdom 100 rose 0.71%.
The best performers of the session on the Investing.com United Kingdom 100 were Standard Chartered PLC (L:STAN), which rose 7.26% or 37.200 points to trade at 549.900 at the close. Meanwhile, Inmarsat PLC (L:ISA) added 4.15% or 45.00 points to end at 1130.00 and Old Mutual PLC (L:OML) was up 4.12% or 6.80 points to 171.80 in late trade.
The worst performers of the session were Anglo American PLC (L:AAL), which fell 5.27% or 14.65 points to trade at 263.55 at the close. Glencore PLC (L:GLEN) declined 4.14% or 3.4900 points to end at 80.8600 and Randgold Resources Ltd (L:RRS) was down 3.47% or 143.00 points to 3977.00.
Rising stocks outnumbered declining ones on the London Stock Exchange by 1434 to 732 and 385 ended unchanged.
Shares in Anglo American PLC (L:AAL) fell to 5-year lows; falling 5.27% or 14.65 to 263.55.
Gold for February delivery was down 2.39% or 25.70 to $1051.10 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in January fell 2.25% or 0.80 to hit $34.72 a barrel, while the February Brent oil contract fell 0.41% or 0.15 to trade at $37.23 a barrel.
GBP/USD was down 0.85% to 1.4871, while EUR/GBP fell 0.10% to 0.7266.
The US Dollar Index was up 0.95% at 99.34.