On Wednesday European stocks saw a decline with investors closely watching Greece, where a deadline is looming for lawmakers to approve creditors' austerity demands.
The Stoxx Europe 600 dipped 0.1% to 397.93, with only the energy, utility and technology sectors posting modest gains.
Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras is facing mutiny in his coalition, as some of his Syriza party members object to the bailout agreement reached with eurozone leaders.
On Tuesday, the International Monetary Fund criticized that deal, questioning Greece’s ability to introduce
the hard measures.
The body cautioned the eurozone must commit
to debt restructuring in order for the bailout program to function. The fund also signaled it might withdraw from the program if the bloc fails to assure the IMF it will trim Greece's public debt to serviceable levels.
Elsewhere, Germany's DAX 30 shed 0.3% to 11,485.68 and in Paris, the CAC 40 was lower 0.2% to 5,019.65.
Spain’s IBEX 35 shed 0.2% to 11,240.50, but Italy’s FTSE MIB stuck to a 0.2% gain at 23,146.10.
London's FTSE 100 fell 0.3% to 6,735.88, on track to register its first loss after five straight sessions of gains. Burberry was down 3% dropping to the bottom of the index. The retailer said it posted a low single-digit decline in sales in the Asia-Pacific region,
hurt by “further deceleration in Hong Kong,” and a “challenging” luxury
market.
Barclays PLC shares were down 0.5% after a media report that the bank’s deputy chairman, Mike Rake, is leaving the bank for a new position of a chairman of payment-services firm Worldpay.
In Greece, stock market is still closed, as are banks.
In the currency market, EUR/USD was last at 1.1023, higher 0.13%.
The pound sterling was slightly higher trading at 1.5638.
Earlier in the U.K., the Office for National Statistics said in a report on jobs and wages that the number of jobless people in the U.K. rose 15,000 in the three months to May, marking the first quarterly rise since 2013. The unemployment rate was 5.6%, little changed from the three months to February. Wages rose 3.2% including bonuses, meeting expectations. Wage growth was 2.8% without bonuses, compared with the 2.9% expected.
