Canada shares lower at close of trade; S&P/TSX Composite down 0.40%

Investing.com – Canada equities were lower at the close on Friday, as losses in the Energy , Clean Technology and Consumer Staples sectors propelled shares lower.

At the close in Toronto, the S&P/TSX Composite fell 0.40%.

The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/TSX Composite were Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc (TO: VRX ), which rose 7.34% or 2.50 points to trade at 36.55 at the close. Alacer Gold Corp (TO: ASR ) added 5.53% or 0.13 points to end at 2.48 and BRP Inc. (TO: DOO ) was up 5.51% or 1.07 points to 20.50 in late trade.

Biggest losers included Birchcliff Energy Ltd . (TO: BIR ), which lost 8.70% or 0.46 points to trade at 4.83 in late trade. BlackBerry Ltd (TO: BB ) declined 7.59% or 0.80 points to end at 9.74 and ARC Resources Ltd . (TO: ARX ) shed 6.41% or 1.21 points to 17.68.

Advancing stocks outnumbered falling ones by 607 to 604 and 353 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 0.27% to 18.50.

In commodities trading, Gold for June delivery was down 0.91% or 11.30 to $1224.30 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in May fell 4.25% or 1.63 to hit $36.71 a barrel, while the June Brent oil contract fell 4.14% or 1.67 to trade at $38.66 a barrel.

CAD/USD was down 0.05% to 0.7686, while CAD/EUR fell 0.19% to 0.6745.

The US Dollar Index was down 0.10% at 94.56.