Canada shares lower at close of trade; S&P/TSX Composite down 0.78%

Investing.com – Canada equities were lower at the close on Tuesday, as losses in the Mining , Materials and IT sectors propelled shares lower.

At the close in Toronto, the S&P/TSX Composite declined 0.78%.

The biggest gainers of the session on the S&P/TSX Composite were Penn West Petroleum Ltd. (TO: PWT ), which rose 4.35% or 0.070 points to trade at 1.680 at the close. Chemtrade Logistics Income Fund (TO: CHE_u ) added 3.17% or 0.56 points to end at 18.22 and Performance Sports Group Ltd (TO: PSG ) was up 2.84% or 0.11 points to 3.98 in late trade.

Biggest losers included First Quantum Minerals Ltd . (TO: FM ), which lost 6.84% or 0.60 points to trade at 8.17 in late trade. Eldorado Gold Corporation (TO: ELD ) declined 5.82% or 0.33 points to end at 5.34 and BRP Inc. (TO: DOO ) shed 5.16% or 1.15 points to 21.12.

Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 835 to 326 and 131 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 3.61% to 18.67 a new 1-month high.

In commodities trading, Gold for August delivery was up 0.15% or 1.95 to $1288.85 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in July fell 0.92% or 0.45 to hit $48.43 a barrel, while the August Brent oil contract fell 1.35% or 0.68 to trade at $49.67 a barrel.

CAD/USD was down 0.10% to 0.7782, while CAD/EUR rose 0.68% to 0.6944.

The US Dollar Index was up 0.66% at 95.04.