France shares lower at close of trade; CAC 40 down 1.78%

Investing.com – France equities were lower at the close on Thursday, as losses in the Industrials , Financials and Gas & Water sectors propelled shares lower.

At the close in Paris, the CAC 40 declined 1.78% to hit a new 52-week low, while the SBF 120 index declined 1.88%.

The biggest gainers of the session on the CAC 40 were EssilorLuxottica SA (PA: ESLX ), which rose 0.05% or 0.05 points to trade at 109.95 at the close. Renault SA (PA: RENA ) fell 0.13% or 0.07 points to end at 54.45 and Vinci SA (PA: SGEF ) was down 0.25% or 0.18 points to 71.42 in late trade.

Biggest losers included Bouygues SA (PA: BOUY ), which lost 4.73% or 1.51 points to trade at 30.39 in late trade. Valeo SA (PA: VLOF ) declined 4.55% or 1.12 points to end at 23.47 and Airbus Group SE (PA: AIR ) shed 4.44% or 3.87 points to 83.33.

The top performers on the SBF 120 were Eramet (PA: ERMT ) which rose 2.66% to 57.85, Groupe FNAC (PA: FNAC ) which was up 0.42% to settle at 48.000 and Covivio SA (PA: FDR ) which gained 0.36% to close at 84.10.

The worst performers were DBV Technologies (PA: DBV ) which was down 69.79% to 7.710 in late trade, Solocal Group SA (PA: LOCAL ) which lost 11.00% to settle at 0.449 and Vallourec (PA: VLLP ) which was down 7.83% to 1.594 at the close.

Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 510 to 90 and 66 ended unchanged on the Paris Stock Exchange.

The CAC 40 VIX , which measures the implied volatility of CAC 40 options, was up 8.48% to 21.01.

In commodities trading, Gold Futures for February delivery was up 0.73% or 9.20 to $1265.60 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in February fell 3.78% or 1.82 to hit $46.35 a barrel, while the February Brent oil contract fell 3.62% or 2.07 to trade at $55.17 a barrel.

EUR/USD was up 0.74% to 1.1460, while EUR/GBP rose 0.24% to 0.9043.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.69% at 95.820.