Stocks in London and mainland Europe fell further on Friday after mixed Asia trading and downbeat UK economic news.
The FTSE 100 Index was off 21.09 points at 6134 while Germany's Dax retreated 77 points and France's Cac-40 fell 33 points.
Chinese stocks trod water despite signs that authorities remain committed to stabilizing now volatile financial markets.
The Japanese Nikkei closed down despite data showing improved third quarter business confidence, with US demand offsetting Chinese concerns.
US markets recorded modest gains following falling import prices, lower weekly jobless claims and an oil price recovery.
The price of a barrel of Brent crude fell 2.3% to US$47.7 and US light crude was 2.6% off at US$44.7.
Despite that, BP (LON:BP.) gushed 2.3p higher to 337.6p, Royal Dutch Shell (LON:RDSB) lifted 3.5p to 1626p and BG Group (LON:BG.) inflated 3.3p to 992.4p.
In the UK, there was more economic bad news as construction output fell by an unexpected 1% in July against a 0.9% rise in June.
Howard Archer at IHS Global Insight said: "it currently looks like UK GDP growth will come in no better than 0.5% quarter-on-quarter in the third quarter, which would be down from expansion of 0.7% quarter-on-quarter in the second quarter."
JD Wetherspoon (LON:JDW) lost early gains to stand 2p down at 718p as the pub group served up lower annual profits and reduced pub openings this year.
Sula Iron & Gold (LON:SULA) softened 0.05p to 0.42p after it identified another potential source of iron ore at its Ferensola project in northern Sierra Leone.
E-commerce group Cloudbuy (LON:CBUY) dropped 1.25p to 17.5p on news that it may undershoot market expectations for the year to December 31.
Oil and gas services supplier Redhall (LON:RHL) plunged 3.88p to 6.25p as it announced a placing and open offer to raise £5.8mln.
New World Oil & Gas (LON:NEW) was flat at 0.07p after rebel investors proposed turning the Belize and Denmark-focused explorer into a medical technology firm.