LONDON: U.K. stocks were lower after the close on Wednesday, as losses in the General Retailers, Healthcare Equipment & Services and Food & Drug Retailers sectors led shares lower. At the close in London, the Investing.com United Kingdom 100 fell 0.14%. The best performers of the session on the Investing.com United Kingdom 100 were Paddy Power Betfair PLC (LON:PPB), which rose 4.48% or 345.00 points to trade at 8050.00 at the close. Meanwhile, Glencore PLC (LON:GLEN) added 3.46% or 12.55 points to end at 375.55 and Anglo American PLC (LON:AAL) was up 3.42% or 48.50 points to 1468.50 in late trade. The worst performers of the session were Next PLC (LON:NXT), which fell 9.14% or 450.00 points to trade at 4471.00 at the close. Standard Chartered PLC (LON:STAN) declined 6.05% or 45.40 points to end at 705.00 and Marks and Spencer Group PLC (LON:MKS) was down 4.45% or 15.30 points to 328.80.
Rising stocks outnumbered declining ones on the London Stock Exchange by 1223 to 768 and 401 ended unchanged. Gold Futures for December delivery was up 0.59% or 7.46 to $1277.96 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in December fell 0.02% or 0.01 to hit $54.37 a barrel, while the January Brent oil contract fell 0.43% or 0.26 to trade at $60.68 a barrel. GBP/USD was down 0.14% to 1.3263, while EUR/GBP fell 0.05% to 0.8764. The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.19% at 94.63.
