Investing.com – Belgium equities were lower at the close on Thursday, as losses in the Telecoms, Basic Materials and Consumer Services sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Brussels, the BEL 20 declined 0.70%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the BEL 20 were Cofinimmo-Sicafi (BR:COFB), which rose 0.45% or 0.50 points to trade at 111.20 at the close. bpost NV (BR:BPOST) added 0.31% or 0.07 points to end at 24.32 and Elia (BR:ELI) was up 0.11% or 0.050 points to 46.140 in late trade.
Biggest losers included NV Bekaert SA (BR:BEKB), which lost 1.99% or 0.84 points to trade at 41.42 in late trade. Ontex Group (BR:ONTEX) declined 1.53% or 0.47 points to end at 30.18 and Ackermans V.Haaren (BR:ACKB) shed 1.34% or 1.55 points to 113.95.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 83 to 57 and 12 ended unchanged on the Brussels Stock Exchange.
In commodities trading, Gold for August delivery was up 0.80% or 10.10 to $1272.40 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in July fell 1.50% or 0.77 to hit $50.46 a barrel, while the August Brent oil contract fell 1.28% or 0.67 to trade at $51.84 a barrel.
EUR/USD was down 0.69% to 1.1316, while EUR/GBP fell 0.31% to 0.7830.
The US Dollar Index was up 0.48% at 94.04.