(MENAFN- AFP) European stock markets were mixed on Tuesday, with Frankfurt and Paris rising slightly and London falling amid a lack of activity.
London's FTSE 100 index of top shares slid 0.53 percent to stand at 6,838.14 points in late morning deals compared with Monday's closing level.
The DAX 30 in Frankfurt, which the previous day had ended for the first time above 10,000 points, climbed 0.13 percent to 10,021.88 points.
The Paris CAC 40 index gained 0.13 percent to 4,595.22 points and the IBEX 35 in Madrid was flat at 11,162.80.
"Markets in general are lacking fresh impulses in the aftermath of last week's ECB action," said Markus Huber, senior analyst at brokers Peregrine & Black.
"Still overall sentiment continues to remain positive and with new economic data flow increasing as the week progresses this might just turnout to be a much needed breather."
In foreign exchange trading on Tuesday, the European single currency fell to $1.3559 from $1.3592 late in New York on Monday.
The euro slipped to 80.68 British pence from 80.90 pence.
The British pound rose to $1.6806 from $1.6799 on Monday.
On the London Bullion Market, gold edged up to $1,254.02 an ounce in Tuesday trading from $1,253.50 Monday.
Official data on Tuesday showed that industrial output across Britain rose by 0.4 percent in April from March.
Manufacturing output -- which excludes mining and quarrying, electricity, gas and water supply -- grew also by 0.4 percent in April.
"April's industrial production figures added to the growing body of evidence suggesting that the economic recovery (in Britain) might have gathered even more pace in the second quarter,"said Samuel Tombs, senior economist at research group Capital Economics.
On the corporate front, shares in Imperial Tobacco gained 0.46 percent to 2,615 pence after the maker of Lambert & Butler and Gauloises cigarettes said it planned to spin off Logista, its European distribution and logistics unit, in an initial public offering on the Spanish stock market.
- Asia mostly up -
In Paris, shares in Gemalto, which provides digital security services, jumped 3.21 percent to 84.59 euros on being chosen by China Telecom to equip telephones with chips for touchless payments.
Shares in Technicolor on the SFB 120 secondary market jumped 3,71 percent to 5.64 euros after the company said it was buying Canadian animated special effects company Mr. X.
Asian stock markets ended mostly higher on Tuesday following fresh records on Wall Street, while Shanghai and Hong Kong advanced after data showed Chinese inflation surged in May.
US stocks had rallied on Monday, with the Dow and the S&P 500 extending record winning streaks amid a fresh burst of merger and acquisition activity on Wall Street.
Official data last Friday showed the US economy added 217,000 jobs in May, bringing the total number in the country above the level at the beginning of the deep 2008-2009 recession for the first time.
Also last week, the European Central Bank pushed the rate at which it pays commercial banks for depositing their unused cash into negative territory for the time, cutting it from zero percent to minus 0.10 percent.
This means banks will be charged for depositing their excess cash with the ECB in a bid to encourage lending, and the central bank said it would also make up to 400 billion euros in cheap long-term funds available to eurozone lenders.
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