European stock markets closed mainly lower on Friday, as news of a US insurance probe expected to extend to European insurers offset a rebound in US indices, dealers said.
The London FTSE 100 index gave up 0.14 percent to close at 4,622.7 points, the Frankfurt DAX 30 dropped 0.47 percent to 3,922.11 points, but the Paris CAC 40 bucked the trend to climb 0.16 percent to 3,670.76 points.
The DJ Euro STOXX 50 index of leading eurozone shares lost 0.11 percent at 2,773.03 points.
The euro stood at US$1.2481.
On Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 32.67 points at 9,926.97, while the tech-heavy NASDAQ composite was 2.53 points higher at 1,90.55.
Insurance stocks across Europe were deeply entrenched in the red, following the dismal performance by Wall Street peers after New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer on Thursday charged the US' largest insurance broker Marsh and McLennan with directing business to insurance companies for illegal payoffs.
Spitzer said Munich-American, a unit of Munich Re's American Re, is among the companies under investigation. American Re said it was not a defendant but is cooperating with the probe.
Dealers expected this investigation to eventually take in most European names with US non-life exposure, with Royal and Sun Alliance one of the British names thought to be most at risk.
Dealers also claimed Barclays has large holdings in Marsh and AIG, and the drop in the share prices of the US group saw the value of Barclays' holdings drop by US$929 million.
In London, Royal and Sun Alliance was the biggest blue-chip loser, falling 2.30 percent to £0.745. Aviva lost 1.62 percent at £5.4650 and Prudential dropped 1.81 percent to £4.6225.
Elsewhere in Europe, the Swiss SMI index slid 0.74 percent to 5,362.4 points, the Amsterdam AEX shed 0.24 percent at 327.94, the Brussels BEL-20 dipped 0.15 percent to 2,743.56 and the Milan MIB-30 lost 0.11 percent at 28,493.0. In Madrid, the IBEX-35 eked out a 0.07-percent gain to finish at 8,261.1.
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