European shares hovered either side of flat late yesterday as Opec's surprise output cut buoyed heavily-weighted oil stocks, but a new weakening of the dollar hit the export-driven chemicals and auto sectors.
Swiss chemicals firm Clariant led its sector down, falling more than six per cent as bleak comments from the company compounded fears that unfavourable currency exchange would eat into euro zone exporters' revenues.
Airlines nabbed the spotlight again as investors' hopes for sector consolidation in Europe lifted Air France, KLM but weighed on Alitalia.
By 1600 GMT, with only Frankfurt still officially open, the FTSE Eurotop 300 index was flat at 896 points, while the DJ Euro Stoxx 50 index was 0.4 per cent lower at 2,482 points.
Strategists said markets had reached a long-awaited consolidation phase, after a rally lifted the benchmark Eurotop 300 index 36 per cent above mid-March's six-year low, and were likely to remain locked in a trading range until fresh news helped investors decide their next move.
"We remain relatively cautious on the prospects for equity markets between now and the end of the year after the past months' spectacular performance," said BNP Paribas European equities strategist Francois Lemoine in Paris.
"Expectations for Q3 earnings are rather high, and will be difficult to beat. Also, two things are still missing to make the picture of global recovery complete: some job creation in the United States and clearer signs of recovery in Europe."
Lemoine said that positive newsflow on these two last points would be a catalyst for a new market rally.
Investors will scrutinise Germany's widely-watched Ifo business confidence survey, published yesterday, for clues on the health of Europe's largest economy after it shrank in the first half of the year.
A bad omen came yesterday in the form of Belgium's leading indicator - widely viewed as a bellwether for the health of the euro zone economy - which worsened slightly in September after having improved in the two previous months.
Around Europe, London and Zurich both closed 0.35 per cent higher but Paris ended off 0.07 per cent.
But Frankfurt sagged two per cent by 1600 GMT as Wall Street weavered in the wake of Opec's decision to cut its oil output amid fears that higher crude prices could crimp consumer spending.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average was one per cent lower, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite shed 1.7 per cent.