European markets drifted lower to close out the week on Friday as US$66 a barrel oil prices weighed on indexes and French GDP data captured investors' attention.
A strike-related service disruption at British Airways and caution in the technology sector also tempered any positive fallout from mostly well-received corporate earnings.
The French CAC 40 index lost 0.7 percent to 4,475.69, while Germany's DAX 30 index lost 0.3 percent to 4,938.61 and the UK's FTSE 100 index declined 0.1 percent at 5,351.7.
European economic news was dominated by GDP data from France. GDP slowed to 0.1 percent in the second quarter, down from 0.4 percent in the first, with year-on-year growth coming in at 1.2 percent.
Analysts had been looking for a 0.2 percent quarterly rise. The first quarter of this year was revised higher to 0.4 percent from 0.3 percent previously.
In the energy markets, oil futures gained again as investors weighed lower global oil-demand estimates and a rise in US crude inventories against strong demand and falling fuel supplies.
British Airways lost 1.4 percent in London, recovering somewhat from steeper earlier declines, as unexpected strikes by ground staff on Thursday forced the company to cancel flights from London's Heathrow Airport through Friday evening. About 70,000 passengers were affected.
Other European flag-carrier Air France-KLM and Deutsche Lufthansa were mixed after initial losses, with Air France-KLM down 1.1 percent and Deutsche Lufthansa up 0.2 percent.
Elsewhere, technology shares came under pressure, with chipmakers Infineon Technologies, STMicroelectronics and ASML all declining.
Sector sentiment was dented after Dell Inc. reported second-quarter sales that missed Wall Street estimates by almost US$300 million and issued a third-quarter sales forecast that was short of analyst expectations.



