Investing.com – U.K. equities were higher at the close on Wednesday, as gains in the Healthcare Equipment & Services, Tobacco and Industrial Transportation sectors propelled shares higher.
At the close in London, the Investing.com United Kingdom 100 rose 1.39%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the Investing.com United Kingdom 100 were AstraZeneca PLC (LON:AZN), which rose 6.73% or 536.0 points to trade at 8499.0 at the close. Avast PLC (LON:AVST) added 5.53% or 26.00 points to end at 496.40 and Tui AG (LON:TUIT) was up 4.98% or 15.00 points to 316.40 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Standard Chartered PLC (LON:STAN), which lost 4.70% or 17.50 points to trade at 355.00 in late trade. CRH PLC (LON:CRH) declined 4.37% or 129.0 points to end at 2821.0 and HSBC Holdings PLC (LON:HSBA) shed 4.12% or 14.30 points to 332.55.
Advancing stocks outnumbered falling ones by 1400 to 785 and 69 ended unchanged on the London Stock Exchange.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for December delivery was down 0.55% or 10.60 to $1899.80 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in December rose 2.28% or 0.86 to hit $38.52 a barrel, while the January Brent oil contract rose 2.39% or 0.95 to trade at $40.66 a barrel.
GBP/USD was down 0.61% to 1.2978, while EUR/GBP rose 0.57% to 0.9017.
The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.02% at 93.545.