Leading shares came off their best levels after a spate of profit taking in mining shares, but still managed to hit a near six week closing high.

A late fall in copper prices after a buildup of stockpiles saw a turnaround among the miners. Anglo American fell 21.1p to 665.5p despite a Bloomberg report that Glencore, down 4.1p at 140p, and BHP Billiton, 5.9p lower at 879.9p, were interested in bidding for its Australian coal mines, which could fetch $1.5bn.

Jasper Lawler, market analyst at CMC Markets, said:

A late bout of weakness in mining shares left the FTSE 100 significantly underperforming other European stock benchmarks. A plunge in copper prices is at odds with the oil rally and making traders a little nervous after the big run up mining shares have had in the last week. Copper futures sunk over 3% after the biggest two-day increase in copper stockpiles monitored by the LME since 2004.

But Royal Dutch Shell A shares rose 55p to $17.56 as it said it expected an extra $1bn of savings from its takeover of BG, and BP was 4.85p better at 373.25p. The oil price rose 1% to $51 on supply concerns, and as the dollar weakened after Monday’s comments from US Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen suggesting that a rate rise may not be imminent.

Overall the FTSE 100 finished 11.13 points higher at 6284.53, although investors were still cautious about the prospects of the UK voting to leave the EU in this month’s referendum.

Clothing retailers were lifted by a British Retail Consortium report showing a modest rise in high street sales in May. Next added 110p to £54.70 and Marks & Spencer rose 0.1p to 363.5p, while Sports Direct International jumped 19.6p to 383.2p as investors shrugged off founder Mike Ashley’s appearance before MPs.

But among the mid-caps Jimmy Choo dropped 4.7p to 109.3p after a negative report on the luxury goods sector from banking group Julius Baer.