Markets continue to search for direction this afternoon, but with Wall Street falling around 30 points in the first half hour of trading, the direction seems to be down at the moment.
So the FTSE 100 has slipped 49.42 to 4132.60, with any bounce seemingly short lived as sellers decide to cash in.
David Buik of BGC Partners said: "The seismic conditions that currently prevail defy belief. There is no logic behind market activity. It is all knee jerk reaction."
There is a clear enough trend for BT, however, up 11% to 124.6p after better than expected second quarter profits and the announcement of 10,000 job cuts. The market, cynical as ever, seems to like the latter news in particular.
But the heavyweight sectors of the FTSE 100 - miners, oil companies and banks, are all in negative territory as commodity prices continue to fall and traders talk of more hefty financial write-offs in the wake of the US Treasury's decision yesterday not to buy up toxic assets through its Tarp.
Elsewhere DSG International - the company formerly known as Dixons - has fallen 8.25p to 20p. Analysts said the drop came after yesterday's profit warning from US rival Best Buy, and news that credit insurer Atradius has cut back on its provision of insurance to some retailers. Comet owner Kesa is down 6.5p to 70.25p while Carphone Warehouse - which has a European joint venture with Best Buy - has lost 3.5p to 139.25p.
Meanwhile - on a lighter note - Mark Brumby at Blue Oar Securities has provided a useful guide to the code increasingly used by companies to gloss over their problems:
"'We remain within the range…' – profits will be at the bottom of expectations.
'We are broadly in line…' – we're down.
'We are concentrating on quality business…' – sales are down.
'We will be second-half-weighted…' – sales are down and may not recover.
'We are investing in future growth…' – sales are down, they may never recover and we are losing money.
'We have appointed advisers to structure our debt to facilitate future growth…' – perhaps better not say too much about this one but so they go on.
"Elsewhere, 'streamlining' (i.e. sacking staff) has already had a couple of outings this morning and is likely to get a thorough airing in weeks / months to come."
