Investing.com – Belgium stocks were lower after the close on Thursday, as losses in the Financials, Basic Materials and Banking sectors led shares lower.
At the close in Brussels, the BEL 20 declined 0.22%.
The best performers of the session on the BEL 20 were Proximus NV (BR:PROX), which rose 1.28% or 0.34 points to trade at 27.36 at the close. Meanwhile, UCB (BR:UCB) added 0.96% or 0.59 points to end at 61.74 and Cofinimmo-Sicafi (BR:COFB) was up 0.85% or 0.90 points to 107.25 in late trade.
The worst performers of the session were ING Groep NV (AS:INGA), which fell 1.48% or 0.200 points to trade at 13.325 at the close. NV Bekaert SA (BR:BEKB) declined 1.01% or 0.40 points to end at 38.53 and KBC (BR:KBC) was down 0.81% or 0.480 points to 58.890.
Rising stocks outnumbered declining ones on the Brussels Stock Exchange by 64 to 46 and 8 ended unchanged.
Gold for February delivery was up 1.45% or 16.55 to $1157.45 a troy ounce. Elsewhere in commodities trading, Crude oil for delivery in February fell 0.68% or 0.37 to hit $53.69 a barrel, while the March Brent oil contract fell 0.32% or 0.18 to trade at $56.78 a barrel.
EUR/USD was up 0.68% to 1.0486, while EUR/GBP rose 0.59% to 0.8572.
The US Dollar Index was down 0.53% at 102.69.