After six consecutive days of gains, the FTSE is down by around 30 points as we approach the close in London.

London’s blue-chip FTSE 100 was down by around 62 points (-1.18%) at 3pm (London time), but as we head into the final hour of trading the index is mounting a charge back up towards its opening level. On the back of Intel’s record sales announcement, ARM Holdings is the only notable winner on the FTSE leader board today. The intellectual property company is up 9.60p (+3.11%). Independent broker ICAP is the day’s biggest loser, down 22.00p (-5.04%), after Numis Securities downgraded the company’s shares from ‘add’ to ‘sell’. The UK’s largest retailer, Burberry, also dropped pennies today, down 29.50p (-3.60%), after Deutsche Bank downgraded the shares from ‘buy’ to ‘hold’.  Other significant
 declines have been recorded by BP, Cairn Energy and Admiral Group, among many others.

Today the ONS reported that UK unemployment fell by 34,000 for the three months to May, bringing the overall jobless rate down to 7.8%, the lowest rate recorded for a year. These figures suggest there may be a hint of stability in the UK economic recovery, at least from a labour market perspective, but the fact that 92% of the newly employed (148,000 of 160,000) in the last quarter are part-time workers should lend a note of caution to the data. The FTSE has shown impressive resolve this afternoon in recovering some of this morning’s losses, but it looks as if all the damage done this morning might stop the streak one day short of a magnificent seven.