London's equity market had very little vitality when it opened for business yesterday. And after US inflation data came in far higher than anyone had estimated, the final props were kicked away. FTSE 100 ended 156.2 lower at 6,300.4. With the Dow closing at another record high on Thursday its sharply falling start came as no surprise. The inflation figures merely accelerated its decline.

British reaction to Wall Street's troubles astonished many dealers. Over the past couple of weeks, Footsie has stood back as Wall Street celebrated so there was some confusion about why it should suddenly get a headache just because the US was nursing a hangover.

Overall turnover was just over 1 billion shares by 6 p.m. with the balance in favour of Footsie stocks. The FTSE 250 index shed 51.6 to 5,763.6 and the SmallCap was relatively resilient, dropping only 6.9 to 2,581.1.