European stock markets mostly lower at open

PARIS: Europe's main stock markets were mostly lower at the start of trading on Friday, as investor attention switched from the European Central Bank's policy decisions a day earlier to a raft of quarterly corporate earnings reports.

In initial deals in the eurozone, Frankfurt's DAX 30 slipped 0.2 percent to 12,424.80 points and the CAC 40 in Paris also slipped 0.2 percent to 5,188.92 points compared with the closing levels on Thursday.

London's benchmark FTSE 100 index of major blue-chip companies was fractionally firmer, inching up 0.1 percent to 7,494.66 points.