Investing.com – U.K. equities were lower at the close on Friday, as losses in the Tobacco, Industrial Engineering and Chemicals sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in London, the Investing.com United Kingdom 100 declined 1.03%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the Investing.com United Kingdom 100 were AstraZeneca PLC (LON:AZN), which rose 3.62% or 156.50 points to trade at 4481.50 at the close. Pearson PLC (LON:PSON) added 1.60% or 10.50 points to end at 667.00 and Diageo PLC (LON:DGE) was up 1.39% or 33.50 points to 2442.00 in late trade.
Biggest losers included British American Tobacco PLC (LON:BATS), which lost 6.80% or 362.00 points to trade at 4960.00 in late trade. Imperial Brands PLC (LON:IMB) declined 3.79% or 130.50 points to end at 3315.50 and Johnson Matthey PLC (LON:JMAT) shed 3.65% or 106.00 points to 2797.00.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 1252 to 598 and 470 ended unchanged on the London Stock Exchange.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for August delivery was up 0.71% or 8.92 to $1268.92 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in September rose 1.35% or 0.66 to hit $49.70 a barrel, while the September Brent oil contract rose 1.88% or 0.97 to trade at $52.46 a barrel.
GBP/USD was up 0.47% to 1.3127, while EUR/GBP rose 0.12% to 0.8949.
The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.57% at 93.24.