Turning away from the big boy markets for a moment, the FTSE Small Cap index was attempting to buck the trend, dropping just 6 points, 0.2%, to 2905.
It was helped primarily by WSP Group, which leaped 172p, 66%, to 432p after the engineering company received a £278m cash offer from Canadian rival Genivar.
The deal, which has been approved by the WSP board and will be put to shareholders, has pushed shares up to just below the offer price of 435p a share.
It has prompted Peel Hunt move from a sell position to hold, saying it does not expect another bidder to become involved.
The company, which used to be part of the FTSE 250, boasts some of the new World Trade Centre site buildings in New York and London's Shard among the projects it is involved with.
With more than 9,000 employees, the company's pretax profits were £19m on revenues of £717.3m.
WSP Chief Executive and founder Christopher Cole will become chairman of Genivar's board after the deal closes and Genivar CEO Pierre Shoiry will maintain his position.
Meanwhile, oil rig maker Lamprell suffered a self-inflicted fall of 27.2p, 27%, to 81.5p after issuing its second profit warning in three weeks.
The announcement was made, unusually, at the close of the markets on Thursday, rather than first thing this morning, but any hopes of burying the bad news failed as the market showed its displeasure.
The UAE-based company said it will make a half-year loss of between $15m and $20m.
Chairman Jonathan Silver resigned as a result, or "move to the position of deputy chairman" as the company prefers to call it.
In May the company issued its first profit warning, putting full-year profits at around $38.5m, compared with the initial $117m estimates. The warning saw it dumped out of the FTSE 250.
The company has blamed a shortage of equipment worldwide and increased costs to wind farm vessels (although the weather has yet to be used as an excuse).
Perhaps most seriously, two senior managers sold shares worth £1.7m just weeks before the first warning in May.
They can expect the recently muscle-flexing FSA to be keeping a close eye on proceedings, although the company deny any wrongdoing.
