Investing.com – Belgium equities were lower at the close on Wednesday, as losses in the Chemicals, Basic Materials and Real Estate sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Brussels, the BEL 20 lost 0.43%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the BEL 20 were Ackermans V.Haaren (BRU:ACKB), which rose 1.31% or 1.80 points to trade at 139.30 at the close. KBC (BRU:KBC) added 0.53% or 0.340 points to end at 64.450 and Etablissementen Fr Colruyt NV (BRU:COLR) was up 0.43% or 0.19 points to 44.01 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Umicore NV (BRU:UMI), which lost 6.43% or 2.77 points to trade at 40.36 in late trade. Solvay SA (BRU:SOLB) declined 1.46% or 1.90 points to end at 128.00 and bpost NV (BRU:BPOST) shed 1.29% or 0.34 points to 25.68.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 95 to 73 and 10 ended unchanged on the Brussels Stock Exchange.
In commodities trading, Gold for August delivery was down 1.05% or 11.60 to $1091.90 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in September fell 1.85% or 0.94 to hit $49.92 a barrel, while the September Brent oil contract fell 0.90% or 0.52 to trade at $56.52 a barrel.
EUR/USD was down 0.48% to 1.0882, while EUR/GBP fell 0.78% to 0.6975.
The US Dollar Index was up 0.47% at 97.87.