Chinese fears see Footsie dragged lower

London’s top flight joined markets worldwide in dropping into the red as worrying Chinese economic data and fears over the Us-china trade war dented investor sentiment.

The latest figures from China signalled slowing industrial production and retail sales growth in October, raising jitters over the world’s second-largest economy.

With markets in Europe and across the Atlantic under pressure, the FTSE 100 Index closed 58.5 points lower at 7,292.8.

Michael Hewson, chief market analyst at CMC Markets, said: “The latest Chinese economic numbers pointed to another slowdown in industrial production and retail sales in October.

“It would appear that there bound seen in september was a one-off and likely fuelled by an attempt to front run the imposition of new US tariffs.”

Luxury fashion house Burberry enjoyed solid share gains as it shrugged off woes in Hong Kong to hike half-year adjusted operating profit by 14 per cent to £203 million, while revenues grew 5 per cent to £1.3 billion.

The group saw shares lift 69p to 2129p despite revealing that Hong Kong sales declined by double digits in the first six months of the year due to anti-government protests.

Oil giants Shell and BP were among the list of share fallers as the cost of crude came under pressure. Shell fell 40p to 2285p and BP dropped 4.5p to 506.3p.

Investment firm 3i was the biggest faller, down 51.5p at 1073.5p, amid fears the sale of a stake in retailer Action will hit its net asset value.