The index finished the day 1.1% up at 1,794 as technology giants Facebook and Google rallied.

Facebook’s shares soared 14% to $61.08, after the social medial group beat analysts’ expectations, posting its strongest revenue growth in two years.

Google was also up 2.6% to $11.35, a day after Lenovo Group committed to buying its Motorola handset division for $2.91bn.

The tech giant’s shares extended gains by a further 4.6% after the closing bell, after the firm reported its own set of forecast-beating quarterly revenue figures.

Meanwhile, economic growth data helped lift sentiment among US investors, with GDP at an annualised rate of 3.2% for the fourth quarter of 2013.

Thursday’s gains have pushed the blue-chip index back into positive territory for the week, but it remains down 2.8% year to date.

Elsewhere, European markets recovered some of their weakness on Thursday; the DAX, Ibex 35 and FTSE MIB all ended the day in positive territory, up 0.4%, 0.7%, and 0.4% respectively.

However, the FTSE did not manage to recover losses, as emerging markets weighed on Britain’s blue chips stocks, and the market ended the day flat at 6,538.