Canada shares lower at close of trade; S&P/TSX Composite down 0.74%

Investing.com – Canada equities were lower at the close on Thursday, as losses in the Energy , Materials and Healthcare sectors propelled shares lower.

At the close in Toronto, the S&P/TSX Composite lost 0.74%.

The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/TSX Composite were Mullen Group Ltd . (TSX: MTL ), which rose 8.56% or 0.79 points to trade at 10.02 at the close. FirstService Corp (TSX: FSV ) added 2.83% or 3.81 points to end at 138.57 and Aritzia Inc (TSX: ATZ ) was up 2.82% or 0.48 points to 17.51 in late trade.

Biggest losers included Cameco Corp (TSX: CCO ), which lost 7.57% or 0.99 points to trade at 12.09 in late trade. OceanaGold Corporation (TSX: OGC ) declined 6.19% or 0.240 points to end at 3.640 and NexGen Energy Ltd. (TSX: NXE ) shed 6.19% or 0.120 points to 1.820.

Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 657 to 386 and 128 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 up 7.27% to 10.47.

In commodities trading, Gold Futures for August delivery was down 0.64% or 9.15 to $1414.45 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in September rose 0.05% or 0.03 to hit $55.91 a barrel, while the September Brent oil contract fell 0.03% or 0.02 to trade at $63.10 a barrel.

CAD/USD was up 0.05% to 0.7600, while CAD/EUR rose 0.05% to 0.6817.

The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.07% at 97.523.