Cyclicals tug Britain's FTSE lower

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* FTSE 100 down 0.1 pct

* Financials, miners weigh

* Hammerson (Frankfurt: 876140 - news) to buy Intu Properties (LSE: INTU.L - news)

* Saga (Frankfurt: 2S8.F - news) drops after profit warning

By Kit Rees

LONDON, Dec (Shanghai: 600875.SS - news) 6 (Reuters) - The UK's top share index fell back to a two-month low on Wednesday, hurt by renewed weakness in mining stocks and financials, while M&A activity was also in focus.

Britain's blue chip FTSE 100 index was down 0.1 percent at 7,317.63 points by 1001 GMT, outperforming a negative European market slightly on the back of a weaker pound.

Financials took nearly 9 points off the index, with shares in HSBC, Lloyds and Barclays (LSE: BARC.L - news) up to 0.8 percent lower.

They were joined by miners, which extended the previous session's losses prompted by drops in base metals prices. Rio Tinto, Glencore (Frankfurt: 8GC.F - news) and BHP Billiton (NYSE: BBL - news) were around 1 percent lower.

Some analysts attributed the falls to profit-taking as the year-end approaches. The FTSE 100 has gained around 2.3 percent so far in 2017.

"We're coming to the end of the year, a lot of equity markets have had a really good 2017," David Madden, market analyst at CMC Markets UK, said.

"That big sell-off that we saw in the UK about a month ago, ever since then ... we haven't really got back to where we were. It's almost like the markets have been rattled by that," Madden added.

Deal-making added some spice at the single-stock level, with shares in Hammerson among the biggest FTSE fallers, down more than 2 percent, after the real estate investment firm said that it would buy shopping centre operator Intu Properties .

Shares (Berlin: DI6.BE - news) in Intu Properties leapt more than 19 percent and were on track for their biggest one-day gain on record.

"Given the long-term and significant recent underperformance in Intu’s share price, something had to eventually give," analysts at Liberum said in a note. Intu (Swiss: OXIGTU.SW - news) 's shares were down almost 30 percent ahead of the announcement.

"Hammerson has a good track record in delivering operational and financial savings. While competition issues are possible, we otherwise view this as a sensible combination," Liberum added.

Shares in property peers British Land Company and Land Securities (LSE: LAND.L - news) also rose 1.6 percent and 1.1 percent respectively.

Among other standout movers, shares in Saga dropped 24.8 percent on the back of a profit warning.

(Reporting by Kit Rees; Editing by Hugh Lawson)