Busy afternoon peters out as market absorbs results

MARKET REPORT: The market closed marginally weaker last night after seeing most volume in afternoon trade.

Settlement Day: September 5th

Stocks fell back across the board, with companies reporting interim results among the most significant losers.

CRH ended the day 4 per cent lower at 16.37 after the market concentrated on the negative aspects of broadly sound interim numbers. Kerry Group also lost ground on the back of first-half results, falling by 10 cents to 14.50 after making significant gains in the past week.

Trade in Paddy Power, which also reported yesterday, was dominated by the placing of 5.6 million shares by two of the firm's directors and venture capital firm, Hg Capital. Shares in the company closed 20 cents lower at 6.25, while the placing came at €6.06.

Ryanair rose by 25 cents to 6.50 as the market warmed to positive August traffic statistics.

Among the financials, AIB dropped 23 cents to €12.62 after some selling activity. Close to 1.6 million shares in the stock changed hands in Dublin. Bank of Ireland saw volume of 3.7 million as it closed nine cents lower at 10.80. The bank bought back 150,000 of its own shares on Monday, paying €10.8767 per share.

Irish Life & Permanent declined in advance of today's interim results, closing 18 cents lower at 10.65. Analysts are expecting a weak life assurance outcome to be offset by strength in the group's banking operations. Anglo Irish gave up 17 cents to finish at 8.88 as the market firmly discounted rumours of a takeover approach by Barclays.

Among smaller caps, IFG climbed five cents to 77 cents after an upgrade from Merrion Stockbrokers. Datalex was three cents lower at 50 cents as the unusually high volume of recent days was maintained. MBO-target IWP added two cents to close at 35 cents.