FTSE ends week with tumble

After reaching a four-month high earlier in the week, the FTSE 100 fell 0.95 per cent today to 6211.50.

The slowness today was blamed on the fall recorded on Wall Street.

Ryan Kneale, market analyst at City bookmaker BetsForTraders.com, said: "Today's falls are well and truly justified when you consider what has been happening this week.

"We have had a big write-down from US insurer AIG, rumours of more banks looking to raise capital, oil prices sky rocketing to new all time record highs and another week of mixed corporate earnings and outlooks.

"This looks to me to be the perfect recipe to take some profits and see how things develop."

Over the day the biggest winners were Experian (up 3.5 per cent), Whitbread (up 1.68 per cent) and mining firm Eurasian (up 1.48 per cent).

On the downside Carphone Warehouse fell 7.27 per cent, miner Kazakhmys was down 6.01 per cent and Sage Group dropped 5.63 per cent.

Kazakhmys fell after it admitted it had rejected a £7.1 billion takeover offer from Eurasian.

Anthony Grech, market analyst at IG Index, said: "Today's market was weak since the off, following significant falls on Wall Street last night.

"Further record highs for oil and weakness across the banking and mining sectors were not doing the London market any favours on Friday and another stuttering start to Wall Street did not help.

"However, this is a market that has proved resilient to US volatility in recent weeks and the UK has spent most of the day recovering some of those sharp early losses."

He added: "Since mid-March, any slides for share prices have proved to be buying opportunities and that does seem to be how investors and traders alike have treated Friday's morning slump.

"The FTSE 100 still has plenty of support running from the 6,000 mark and although it looks set to end the week fairly flat, many will still be aiming for a run up to the 6,300 levels when trading resumes on Monday."