UK stocks gave up early gains to end lower on Friday, notching up a third straight week of losses as miners such as Antofagasta fell after China moved to curb rapid credit growth, raising fears of lower demand for commodities.
Steelmaker Corus and precious metal refiner Johnson Matthey joined the decline triggered by China's decision to raise banks' reserve requirements, limiting the amount commercial banks can lend.
"Developments in China are clearly being watched particularly closely by the commodities part of the index," said Darren Winder, a strategist at UBS.
"We are very much seeing this as a cautionary move to ensure growth remains stable and robust over the medium term."
The FTSE 100 closed 21.9 points, or 0.4 percent, lower at 5,597.4 points, having traded as high as 5,701.5 during the session.
A global equity sell-off over the last month has seen the FTSE fall as much as 11 percent from a five-year high set in April above 6,100 points.
The index had steadied after the sharp falls in May, but has now suffered three straight weeks of losses - falling 1 percent this week.
"We have had a panic attack over the last few weeks and the market is concerned about inflation getting out of control and growth slowing down," said Robert Parkes, UK equity strategist at HSBC Securities.
"But we don't think the outlook is particularly bleak and we are not forecasting a hard landing."
Earlier, miners had led the FTSE higher as inflation fears had been eased by comments from US Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on Thursday.
But most of the sector finished in negative territory. Antofagasta fell 1.6 percent to 1,896 pence, having earlier hit 2,035p while BHP Billiton dropped 2.2 percent to 960p, having peaked at 1,012-1/2p during the session.
Metals refiner Johnson Matthey fell 2.2 percent and Corus slipped 1.4 percent.
On the upside, utility Scottish Power rose 3.9 percent after investment bank Morgan Stanley issued an upbeat research note on the stock in the wake of a presentation from the company.
Retailer Marks & Spencer added 3.3 percent after Deutsche Bank said the shares were undervalued given the recovery of the underlying business.
"The market has been too focused on one statistic, the uplifts from M&S's refurbishment programme - and missed the bigger picture," Deutsche said in a note.
Back on the downside, leisure firm Ladbrokes fell 3.4 percent.
The stock is due to fall out of the FTSE 100 into the FTSE 250 on Monday as the quarterly index rejig sees miners Vedanta and Lonmin and power company Drax promoted.
Telecoms firm Cable & Wireless and publisher Daily Mail are the other two companies due for demotion to the mid-cap index.
Among mid-caps, engineer and project manager Amec tumbled 9.6 percent, dented by news that trading conditions remain tough in the UK, dealers say.
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