Financials pull European shares to lower close

* FTSEurofirst 300 falls 1.2 percent

* Banks leading losers; Deutsche Bank down 3.7 pct

* Insurers also weak; AXA drops 4 pct

* U.S. data sends mixed signals on economic recovery

By Peter Starck

FRANKFURT, May 28 (Reuters) - European shares fell on Thursday, led by financials such as Deutsche Bank (DBKGn.DE) and AXA (AXAF.PA), with scant corporate news to give direction and U.S. data sending mixed signals on economic recovery prospects.

The FTSEurofirst 300 .FTEU3 index of top European shares closed 1.2 percent lower at 860.21 points, having fallen as much as 2.0 percent earlier in the session.

The benchmark, which lost 45 percent in 2008, advanced 36 percent from a lifetime low on March 9 until May 7 and has remained rangebound between about 823 and 878 points since then.

"The stock markets have no trigger to move up," said Giuseppe-Guido Amato, equity strategist at German brokerage Lang & Schwarz. "If they refuse to go up, they'll go down."

"The green shoots (of economic recovery) have been priced in by now. We need something else," Amato added, referring to an impulse that could drive equities higher.

New orders for long-lasting U.S. manufactured goods saw their biggest gain in 16 months in April and fewer U.S. workers filed for new jobless benefits last week, suggesting that the recession was abating.

But sales of newly built U.S. single-family homes rose less than expected in April and the previous month's figures were revised down to show a steeper fall.

"The revision of the U.S. new home sales data was bad news," Amato said. The housing data saw leading U.S. stock market indexes turn negative and pulled European shares to intra-day lows.

A rise in the oil price CLc1 toward $65 a barrel on the back of a bigger than expected fall in U.S. crude oil inventories lifted Wall Street energy stocks such as Exxon (XOM.N) and helped European shares trim some losses.

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