Investing.com – U.K. equities were lower at the close on Monday, as losses in the Pharmaceuticals & Biotech, Oil Equipment Services & Distribution and Oil & Gas Producers sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in London, the Investing.com United Kingdom 100 declined 0.68%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the Investing.com United Kingdom 100 were Next PLC (LON:NXT), which rose 5.70% or 364.0 points to trade at 6750.0 at the close. Ocado Group PLC (LON:OCDO) added 5.51% or 119.79 points to end at 2293.79 and Persimmon PLC (LON:PSN) was up 5.56% or 137.0 points to 2600.0 in late trade.
Biggest losers included AstraZeneca PLC (LON:AZN), which lost 5.37% or 438.0 points to trade at 7722.0 in late trade. Centrica PLC (LON:CNA) declined 3.80% or 1.65 points to end at 41.81 and Royal Dutch Shell PLC Class A (LON:RDSa) shed 3.05% or 42.69 points to 1356.81.
Advancing stocks outnumbered falling ones by 1368 to 922 and 67 ended unchanged on the London Stock Exchange.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for February delivery was down 0.74% or 13.60 to $1830.00 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in January fell 1.55% or 0.72 to hit $45.85 a barrel, while the February Brent oil contract fell 1.30% or 0.65 to trade at $49.32 a barrel.
GBP/USD was up 0.87% to 1.3337, while EUR/GBP fell 0.63% to 0.9098.
The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.22% at 90.727.