Canada shares higher at close of trade; S&P/TSX Composite up 0.70%

Investing.com – Canada equities were higher at the close on Wednesday, as gains in the Energy , IT and Materials sectors propelled shares higher.

At the close in Toronto, the S&P/TSX Composite gained 0.70%.

The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/TSX Composite were First Majestic Silver Corp. (TO: FR ), which rose 15.68% or 1.70 points to trade at 12.54 at the close. Russel Metals Inc . (TO: RUS ) added 12.99% or 2.68 points to end at 23.31 and Stantec Inc. (TO: STN ) was up 12.10% or 3.50 points to 32.43 in late trade.

Biggest losers included ATS Automation Tooling Systems Inc. (TO: ATA ), which lost 11.52% or 1.28 points to trade at 9.83 in late trade. Lucara Diamond Corp (TO: LUC ) declined 11.20% or 0.420 points to end at 3.330 and BRP Inc. (TO: DOO ) shed 6.86% or 1.72 points to 23.34.

Advancing stocks outnumbered falling ones by 692 to 476 and 137 ended unchanged on the Toronto Stock Exchange.

The S&P/TSX 60 VIX , which measures the implied volatility of S&P/TSX Composite options, was down 10.92% to 14.03.

In commodities trading, Gold for December delivery was up 0.20% or 2.50 to $1277.00 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in December rose 0.89% or 0.40 to hit $45.38 a barrel, while the January Brent oil contract rose 1.19% or 0.55 to trade at $46.59 a barrel.

CAD/USD was down 0.90% to 0.7461, while CAD/EUR rose 0.12% to 0.6840.

The US Dollar Index was up 0.75% at 98.61.