London close: Footsie drops on fresh concerns for Greece

With a surprise referendum vote on the Greek bail-out announced, a mass sell-off was seen in stock markets across the globe on Tuesday, not helped by some worrying manufacturing data at home and away. The Footsie may have finished some 78 points off its intraday lows, but that wasn't enough to pull the blue chip index into the blue, as it still closed down 123 at 5,422.GREEK REFERENDUM SCARES MARKETSThe decision by George Papandreou, the Greek Prime Minister, to hold a referendum on the details of the Greek bailout tortuously negotiated by Eurozone leaders, sent London sharply into reverse this morning. The announcement means that voters would be given the chance to reject the package, meaning that the country would then be unable to pay its debts. Papandreou also said that he would ask for a confidence vote, which will begin at the end of the week.Analysts at Barclays Capital said, "There has been widespread public discontent about the impact of the austerity measures, and over the weekend a survey found nearly 60% of those questioned opposed the latest deal. This raises the possibility of a 'no' vote.""While our economists expect the government to win the confidence vote, in our view, these are risky strategies and they open the possibility that the euro area package will unravel before it even begins," they said.A 'no' vote could result in the "complete meltdown of the European banking system and throw Europe into turmoil," according to Michael Hewson, market analyst at CMC Markets.Not helping things either was news that activity in both the UK and the Chinese manufacturing sectors fell to the lowest levels since early 2009. The UK Markit/CIPS manufacturing purchasing managers' index (PMI) fell from 50.8 to 47.4 in October, while the China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing's manufacturing PMI fell from 51.2 to 50.4. Also, the manufacturing ISM Index, one of the best gauges of the health of the manufacturing sector in the US, gave a reading of 50.8% in October, less than the 52% figure analysts had been predicting and is 0.8% down on September. On a positive note, the Office for National Statistics revealed today that UK gross domestic product rose at an annual and quarterly rate of 0.5% in the third quarter. Barclays Capital was expecting a more modest quarter-on-quarter up-tick of 0.3% growth. "Amid growing concerns about the UK growth and employment outlook, there will be some relief that these data were a little better than expected. However, we would caution against over interpreting the unexpected strength in today's numbers," said economist Chris Crowe. G4S BUCKS TREND, BANKS & MINERS TUMBLESecurity firm G4S was one of the few companies in the blue as investors celebrated the move to abandon its purchase of Danish cleaning company ISS for £5.2bn after shareholders blocked the deal. According to Alf Duch-Pedersen, chairman of G4S, shareholders raised concerns over the "scale and complexity" of the transaction. The stock sank in mid-October after group announced the potential acquisition. However, the global financial sector was reeling on those fresh concerns of a Greek default, and stocks in London were no exception. Barclays topped the fallers, losing nearly a tenth, not helped by UBS which downgraded its rating on the bank from buy to neutral following its third quarter results yesterday. Man Group and RBS were also among the worst performers. Legal & General dropped after revealing this morning that new business sales, on an annualised premium equivalent basis, eased 1% to £1,338m from £1,347m the year before. Miners were out of favour on Tuesday also, as the worrying data in China spurred concerns over demand for resources from the world's second-largest economy. Kazakhmys, Antofagasta and Xstrata were firmly in the red. INVESTORS CELEBRATE BWIN.PARTY GAMBLEShares in online gaming firm bwin.party roared 12% higher after the firm revealed a potentially lucrative deal to offer real money online poker in the US. The group said that is has signed a joint venture agreement and B2B agreement with hotel and casino operators MGM Resorts International and Boyd Gaming Corporation. However, there is one stumbling stock - bills to regulate, license and tax online poker in the country have not yet been passed by the government. Analyst James Hollins from Evolution Securities said that the agreements "should drive massive potential revenue upside, but only if and when the US introduces federal legislation. The likelihood and timing of this remains a key question, although we welcome the deal," he said in a research note this morning. BCFTSE 100 - RisersReckitt Benckiser Group (RB.) 3,255.00p +1.78%British Sky Broadcasting Group (BSY) 709.50p +0.78%Diageo (DGE) 1,297.00p +0.62%G4S (GFS) 245.20p +0.41%British American Tobacco (BATS) 2,866.00p +0.05%Next (NXT) 2,557.00p +0.04%Imperial Tobacco Group (IMT) 2,275.00p +0.04%FTSE 100 - FallersBarclays (BARC) 176.75p -9.50%Man Group (EMG) 136.00p -9.27%Royal Bank of Scotland Group (RBS) 22.28p -8.05%International Consolidated Airlines Group SA (IAG) 154.70p -7.20%Legal & General Group (LGEN) 102.60p -7.15%Kazakhmys (KAZ) 861.50p -7.12%Xstrata (XTA) 976.10p -6.64%Aviva (AV.) 318.30p -6.60%InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) 1,076.00p -6.35%Weir Group (WEIR) 1,799.00p -6.25%