London close: Late recovery not enough, Footsie ends 1% lower

While the blue chip index still closed with moderate losses, a late partial recovery assured that the Footsie finished firmly above the 5,800 level - after dipping below at in the early afternoon - on reports that US politicians had drawn up a "rough agreement" in regards to the debt ceiling and deficit. However, an extremely late sell-off saw the index slide 30 points in the final few minutes of trade to finish almost 1% down on the day.The afternoon rally was spurred by comments from US President Barack Obama that reassured nervous investors that Republicans and Democrats are now in "rough agreement" regarding their views on the debt ceiling front, according to Bloomberg."There are lot of crises in the world that we can't always predict or avoid - hurricanes, earthquakes, tornadoes, terrorist attacks. This isn't one of those crises. The power to solve this is in our hands," he said. "This is one burden we can end ourselves, we can end it with a simple vote."The more optimistic mood followed a sharp decline after the Commerce Department revealed at 13:30 that US GDP grew at a rate of 1.3% in the second quarter, well below forecasts of 1.8%. The government agency also announced that it had revised down its estimate for first quarter growth, from 1.9% to just 0.4%. In company news, the banking sector was out of favour, with Lloyds among the worst performers, after RBS downgraded the lender from buy to hold, saying that there appears to be a lack of catalysts for the shares in the near-term. Barclays and Standard Chartered were also among the worst performers on the blue chip index. Meanwhile, strong gains for Vodafone boosted the mobile telecoms sector after it picked up the phone to some good news this morning. The firm said that it will receive a dividend worth £2.8bn from US associate company Verizon Wireless. Sector peer Inmarsat was wanted a day after reports surfaced that it would benefit from a massive deal signed by its US partner group LightSquared. LightSquared, which operates a wireless broadband and satellite network in the US, signed a 15-year spectrum hosting and network services agreement with Sprint Nextel worth a total of $9bn. BSkyB was in demand after demonstrating why Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation was so keen to get his hands on the broadcaster with a sharp rise in revenues and profits. BSkyB also announced a buy-back of £750m and dividend of 14.54p per shareShares in British Airways operator International Consolidated Airlines (IAG) took off after it moved into profit in the second quarter, but economic weakness in some markets and high oil prices remain a concern. Pest control and cleaning services group Rentokil was shining after it revealed a 6.8% decline in half yearly pre-tax profit as trading deteriorated at its struggling parcels division City Link. Losses at its City Link division widened to £17.8m from £4.7m the year before. Marketing firm Hasgrove's shares fell after it said it had seen a difficult start to the year at its two design businesses. Gross income in the first half of the year is expected to come in at about £13.7m, down from £14.1m a year ago, with pre-exceptional operating profit declining to £1.6m from £1.7m. BCFTSE 100 - RisersVodafone Group (VOD) 172.00p +3.99%Pearson (PSON) 1,174.00p +3.07%Fresnillo (FRES) 1,760.00p +2.21%International Consolidated Airlines Group SA (IAG) 237.30p +2.02%BT Group (BT.A) 201.00p +1.57%Rolls-Royce Group (RR.) 652.50p +1.16%Kazakhmys (KAZ) 1,348.00p +0.82%Johnson Matthey (JMAT) 2,040.00p +0.79%Prudential (PRU) 690.00p +0.73%Capita Group (CPI) 718.00p +0.56%FTSE 100 - FallersLloyds Banking Group (LLOY) 43.35p -3.67%Anglo American (AAL) 2,900.00p -3.27%Standard Chartered (STAN) 1,558.00p -2.50%BHP Billiton (BLT) 2,273.00p -2.34%IMI (IMI) 1,050.00p -2.23%Barclays (BARC) 223.00p -2.15%Reckitt Benckiser Group (RB.) 3,457.00p -2.12%Carnival (CCL) 2,116.00p -2.08%Centrica (CNA) 306.60p -2.04%Amec (AMEC) 1,054.00p -2.04%