Financials fare with mixed fortunes

Dublin report:The Irish stock market was a little bit off again yesterday, after a mildly negative day on Monday, dropping a further 42 points to end the day half a per cent down in value.

The day's trading yielded mixed fortunes for financial stocks, with Anglo Irish Bank proving to be the outperformer, climbing 1.38 per cent to €12.47.

But given the stock lost 4.6 per cent the previous day, amid reports it was considering the future of its subsidiary in Switzerland, the modest rise yesterday won't have had holders of the stock jumping with joy.

Among the other banks, AIB managed to finish up six cent at €16.69, on a day in which it re-issued 13,000 ordinary shares that had been held as treasury shares to participants in the AIB share option schemes.

Irish Life & Permanent also added six cent to close at €15.46, but Bank of Ireland let the side down by slipping four cent to €12.30.

Elsewhere, CRH struggled, shedding 48 cent to close at €26.86, a drop of 1.76 per cent. The stock bounced about a bit during the day from a low of €26.69 to €27.30.

Grafton dropped 16 cent - a fall of almost 2 per cent - to close at €8.28, while insulation firm Kingspan had an even worse time of it, falling 4 per cent to €15.98, down 67 on the day.

Ryanair's share price also took a mini-nosedive yesterday, losing nine cent to land on €5.56, a fall of 1.6 per cent.

The airline purchased for cancellation 1.5 million of its own shares, paying €5.50 per share.

It wasn't a great day for packaging group Smurfit Kappa, which lost 3.4 per cent to finish at €14.30, down 50 cent on the previous day's trading.

Meanwhile Independent News & Media fell 10 cent to €2.64.