Stock exchange on edge after US losses

The London Stock Exchange remained on edge as further losses in the US again drove down the benchmark FTSE-100 Index.

The market ended the day 48.5 points lower at 6149.6 after seeing Wall Street open in downbeat mood this afternoon.

Having shrugged off early losses when the Footsie lost up to 60 points in the first seven minutes, traders spent much of the day treading water.

However, both the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the tech-dominated Nasdaq, which have been rocked in recent days by gloomy economic warnings, put paid to hopes of a market recovery on this side of the Atlantic.

One of the biggest name casualties from the sell-off was the London market's heaviest stock, Vodafone.

Vodafone's 6% dive had come as a result of Hong Kong conglomerate Hutchinson Whampoa offloading part of its stake in the UK company.

The mobile phone giant, which has also sealed a deal to buy a third of Mexico's second largest wireless carrier Grupo Iusacell, was down 14.50p at 227.75p.

The plight of Vodafone knocked confidence in a number of other techs and telecoms, including Energis, down 21p at 465p, Logica, off 50p at £14.99 and Misys down 20p at 620p.

Other fallers included pest control-to-office services group Rentokil, which today announced the sale of its UK personnel services division, but was still down more than 7%, or 16.25p, at 209.75p.

Those bucking the downwards trend were a mix of new and old economy stocks, led by semiconductor firm ARM Holdings, up 34p at 542p.

Software group Autonomy was also stronger by 94p at £16.29 after announcing a new alliance with computer giant IBM.