A FLURRY of takeover activity in London and a continued recovery on Wall Street allowed the Irish market to push ahead strongly yesterday, with the focus of activity on the main financial shares.

With indications that the Wall Street recovery was showing signs of broadening, dealers in Dublin were tentatively suggesting that the market could yet go to a new high by the Christmas Eve close.

Among the financials, Bank of Ireland was the main beneficiary of the renewed bullishness and dealt up 12p to 520p in sizeable volume. Other financials were less active, but AIB pushed ahead 2 1/2p to 385p in good size, although both Irish Life and Irish Permanent were marginally weaker after recent good runs.

There was no great level of activity among most of the industrials, but CRH saw some good sized trading in London - about a million shares dealt - and closed up 2p on 600p. Smurfit was 1p easier on 169p while Kerry drifted 5p to 595p. Greencore was another stock in strong demand and closed up 4p on 370p while Hibernian was 10 higher on 285p.

Gilts were marginally easier as the Irish market underperformed the German bond market. The surge in prices in the wake of the EMU stability pact now seems to have shot its bolt, with some concerns in the market about the pound's inability to clamber back above parity.

At the close on the forex markets, the pound was trading at 99.54p against sterling with no sign of strengthening.