Investing.com – Belgium stocks were higher after the close on Thursday, as gains in the Healthcare, Utilities and Financials sectors led shares higher.
At the close in Brussels, the BEL 20 rose 0.54%.
The best performers of the session on the BEL 20 were Galapagos NV (AS:GLPG), which rose 2.07% or 1.740 points to trade at 85.860 at the close. Meanwhile, UCB (BR:UCB) added 1.41% or 0.94 points to end at 67.60 and Ageas (BR:AGES) was up 1.14% or 0.490 points to 43.490 in late trade.
The worst performers of the session were Proximus NV (BR:PROX), which fell 2.33% or 0.61 points to trade at 25.56 at the close. bpost NV (BR:BPOST) declined 2.30% or 0.50 points to end at 21.24 and Ontex Group (BR:ONTEX) was down 0.73% or 0.16 points to 21.90.
Rising stocks outnumbered declining ones on the Brussels Stock Exchange by 56 to 51 and 17 ended unchanged.
Shares in Ageas (BR:AGES) rose to 5-year highs; rising 1.14% or 0.490 to 43.490.
Gold Futures for April delivery was down 0.58% or 7.70 to $1317.90 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in April rose 0.56% or 0.34 to hit $61.30 a barrel, while the May Brent oil contract rose 0.48% or 0.31 to trade at $65.20 a barrel.
EUR/USD was down 0.36% to 1.2323, while EUR/GBP fell 0.34% to 0.8828.
The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.29% at 90.01.