Commodity stocks subsided after dismal Chinese trade data on Tuesday, keeping London shares firmly in the red.
Miners were in the dumps after data showed China's imports falling about a fifth, down for the 11th month in a row. Exports fell 1.1% from a year earlier.
The bigger-than-expected drop, the steepest in almost three years, cast more doubt over the health of Asia's economic powerhouse.
Commodity trader Glencore (LON:GLEN) led the mining sector lower with a 7.15p drop to 114p, followed by Kaz Minerals (LON:KAZ), down 8.5p to 136p.
Rio Tinto (LON:RIO) backtracked 38.5p to 2498.5p, Anglo American (LON:AAL) reversed 24.6p to 667.1p and BHP Billiton (LON:BLT) drifted 27.5p to 1150p.
Craig Erlam, senior market analyst at London forex broker OANDA, said the biggest concern over the Chinese data was the huge decline in imports.
"While a large part of this can be attributed to the collapse in commodity prices and should therefore ease off in the coming months, there does also appear to be a domestic demand problem," he said.
The FTSE 100 Index fell 64.08 points to 6307, Germany's DAX dropped 140.5 points and France's CAC-40 was 72.8 points off.
In UK economic news, UK retail sales increased 2.6% on a like-for-like basis in September against the same month a year ago, although the inclusion of the August Bank Holiday gave the figures a positive skew.
UK CPI inflation turned negative for the second month in 2015, falling 0.1% in September due to lower fuel and clothing prices.
Manoj Ladwa at TJM Partners said: "While this is likely to prevent the Bank of England from hiking interest rates in the near-term, it also further indicates the UK economy is struggling to grow."
Figures already out on Tuesday confirmed the drop in German inflation for September, with the EU harmonised measure aligning with the flash estimate of -0.2%Y/Y, representing a decline of 0.3ppt from August to the lowest since January.
The latest German ZEW survey of economic sentiment figure plunged to a year low of 1.9 from 12.1 last month as global economic jitters and the Volkswagen scandal took their toll.
Back in the UK, shares in SABMiller (LON:SAB) jumped 325p to 3946.5p as it agreed a £68bn proposed takeover by rival Anheuser-Busch InBev (NYSE:BUD), whose shares were also up, rising 1.9% to €100.25.
Housebuilder Bellway (LON:BWY) strengthened 87p to 2457p on news of record sales and higher profits, although the company noted continuing labour shortages.
Other housebuilders rallied after the news and on official figures showing UK house prices rose 0.7% month-on-month in August.
Barratt Developments (LON:BDEV) ticked up 9p to 635p, Persimmon (LON:PSN) lifted 29p to 1965p and Berkeley Group (LON:BKG) gained 36p to 3246p.
Elsewhere, shares in Empyrean Energy (LON:EME) powered up 0.25p to 7.25p as it revealed an independent upgrade of its reserves volumes at its Sugarloaf project in the Eagle Ford shale in the US.
Galantas Gold Corp (LON:GAL) dimmed 0.88p to 3.62p as it revealed that its plans for underground mining at its Omagh gold mine in Northern Ireland could face a judicial review.
Shares in Intelligent Energy (LON:IEH) were flat at 97p as the fuel cell developer said it would lead a pan-European industry working group to develop its proprietary 90kW EC fuel cell automotive technology.
Defence technology group Cohort (LON:CHRT) fired up 14p to 391p as it won a £3mln electronic warfare support services contract from an unidentified customer.
LONDON OPEN
Falling Chinese imports took the stuffing out of European shares on Tuesday, although a long-awaited brewing mega-deal lent support.
Data showed China's imports falling about a fifth, down for the 11th month in a row. The drop, the steepest in almost three years, cast more doubt over the health of Asia's economic powerhouse.
September imports dipped by a bigger-than-expected 17.7% in yuan-denominated terms, while exports fell 1.1% from a year earlier, according to official figures.
Craig Erlam, senior market analyst at London forex broker OANDA, said: "The biggest concern is the huge decline in imports.
"While a large part of this can be attributed to the collapse in commodity prices and should therefore ease off in the coming months, there does also appear to be a domestic demand problem."
The FTSE 100 Index fell 44.21 points to 6326, Germany's DAX dropped 125.8 points and France's CAC-40 was 78.85 points off.
In UK economic news, UK retail sales increased 2.6% on a like-for-like basis in September against the same month a year ago, although the inclusion of the August Bank Holiday gave the figures a positive skew.
UK CPI inflation was expected to be 0% m/m in September, according to Danske Bank. "While declining gasoline and diesel prices were a drag on inflation in September, we estimate that this was offset by higher inflation in the price of services. This is also the reason why we expect core inflation to have moved slightly higher in September."
Figures already out on Tuesday confirmed the drop in German inflation for September, with the EU harmonised measure aligning with the flash estimate of -0.2%Y/Y, representing a decline of 0.3ppt from August to the lowest since January.
The latest German ZEW survey of analyst sentiment was tipped to dip to its weakest since July while the expectations index is set to post a larger drop for the sixth successive month to its lowest in a year, at least in part reflecting the troubles at Volkswagen.
Back in the UK, shares in SABMiller (LON:SAB) jumped 302p to 3923.5p as it agreed a £68bn proposed takeover by rival Anheuser-Busch InBev (NYSE:BUD), whose shares were also up, rising 1.9% to €100.25.
Housebuilder Bellway (LON:BWY) strengthened 87p to 2457p on news of record sales and higher profits, although the company noted continuing labour shortages.
Elsewhere, shares in Empyrean Energy (LON:EME) powered up 0.12p to 7.12p as it revealed an independent upgrade of its reserves volumes at its Sugarloaf project in the Eagle Ford shale in the US.
Galantas Gold Corp (LON:GAL) dimmed 0.5p to 4p as it revealed that its plans for underground mining at its Omagh gold mine in Northern Ireland could face a judicial review.
MARKET PREVIEW
London’s blue-chip stocks are expected to start Tuesday slightly softer following some downbeat economic stats from China.
Chinese export figures, showing a 1.1% year-on-year decline for September, turned Asian benchmarks negative.
“Many countries in the region rely heavily on sales to China so unless this demand picks up in the coming quarters, not only are we going to see below 7% growth in the world’s second largest economy, it’s going to decline sharply for many of its trade partners as well,” said Craig Erlam, analyst at OANDA.
The Shanghai composite was only a nudge lower at 3,285. Japan’s Nikkei, meanwhile, was off about 1% at 18,241 while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was some 0.6% lower at 22,594.
Australia’s down 0.55% at around 5,200.
US markets were partially closed on Monday due to the Columbus Day holiday, and investors in London will look across the Atlantic as the day progresses towards the Wall Street open for a further steer.
IG Markets is calling the FTSE 100 about 7 points lower at 6,364 to 6,366.