Investing.com – U.K. equities were higher at the close on Thursday, as gains in the Beverage, Insurance and Mobile Telecommunications sectors propelled shares higher.
At the close in London, the Investing.com United Kingdom 100 rose 0.13%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the Investing.com United Kingdom 100 were Hiscox Ltd (LON:HSX), which rose 5.06% or 55.00 points to trade at 1,141.00 at the close. Whitbread PLC (LON:WTB) added 3.87% or 111.00 points to end at 2,981.00 and Diageo PLC (LON:DGE) was up 3.72% or 87.00 points to 2,428.50 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Frasers Group PLC (LON:FRAS), which lost 10.66% or 79.00 points to trade at 662.00 in late trade. Segro Plc (LON:SGRO) declined 2.92% or 22.60 points to end at 752.20 and DS Smith PLC (LON:SMDS) shed 2.43% or 14.00 points to 563.00.
Advancing stocks outnumbered falling ones by 993 to 809 and 628 ended unchanged on the London Stock Exchange.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for February delivery was down 0.75% or 19.94 to $2,656.26 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in January fell 0.07% or 0.05 to hit $68.49 a barrel, while the February Brent oil contract fell 0.03% or 0.02 to trade at $72.29 a barrel.
GBP/USD was up 0.43% to 1.28, while EUR/GBP unchanged 0.13% to 0.83.
The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.45% at 105.82.