LONDON - Britain's leading share index was flat after a choppy session on the last day of the second quarter, with gains by AstraZeneca after a key US patent was upheld just countering weakness in miners.

At the close, the FTSE 100 was up 2.65 points, or 0.1 percent at 4,916.87, notching up a 13.4 percent decline for the second-quarter, the worst performance since the third quarter of 2002 when the dot.com boom collapsed.

@MARKET ROUNDUP:EUROFIRST

EUROPE - European shares fell to a three-week closing low on Wednesday, posting their worst quarterly performance in more than a year, as poor US jobs data fuelled fears about the pace of the economic recovery.

The FTSEurofirst 300 index of top European shares unofficially closed down 0.3 percent at 993.04 points.

@MARKET ROUNDUP:EUROmarkets

FRANKFURT - The DAX index ended at 5,965.52 points, up 13.49 or 0.23 percent.

PARIS - The CAC-40 index closed at 3,442.89 points, up 9.9 or 0.29 percent.

ZURICH - The Swiss market index closed at 6,128.06 points, down 16.39 or 0.27 percent.

MILAN - The FT IT All Share index closed at 19,869.4 points, up 75.69 or 0.38 percent.

@MARKET ROUNDUP:nikkei

TOKYO - The Nikkei average closed down 1.96 percent at a key support level after hitting a seven-month low, booking its worst quarterly performance since the last quarter of 2008, after the Lehman Brothers collapse. The Nikkei shed 188.03 points to 9,382.64, clinging just at a key support level near 9,378. The index earlier fell as far as 9,347.07, a seven-month low.

@MARKET ROUNDUP:hang seng

HONG KONG - Shanghai shares struck a 14-month low as investor selling to make way for the mega IPO from Agricultural Bank of China exacerbated a slide on this year's crackdown on the red-hot property market and bank lending. Mainland shares pushed Hong Kong's Hang Seng index down 0.59 percent or 119.91 points to 20,128.99.

@MARKET ROUNDUP:asx

SYDNEY - Shares trimmed losses to end down 1.02 percent, dominated by slides in the miners and top investment bank Macquarie Group on jitters about the global growth outlook. The S&P/ASX 200 index shed 44.2 points to end at 4,301.5, a five-week low, ending June down 2.9 percent.

@MARKET ROUNDUP:south africa

JOHANNESBURG - South African stocks slid, hit by further concerns about global growth and booking their worst quarterly performance since the 2008 financial crisis.

The All-share index closed at 26,258.82 points, down 439.88 or 1.65 percent.