Financials up as Iseq advances on limited activity

Dublin Report: The market picked up yesterday but activity was fairly limited, particularly among the larger names.

The biggest exceptions to this came in the financials, with Anglo and Irish Life & Permanent both outperforming. Anglo rose by 23 cent to €13.55 in advance of next week's interim results, while Irish Life & Permanent added 25 cent to close at €20.55.

The other banks failed to take off to the same extent, with AIB adding 10 cent to finish at €18.85 and Bank of Ireland rising a mere three cent to €14.70.

Rumours that Santander could be mulling a takeover of AIB appeared to dissipate yesterday after the Spanish bank was named as a suitor for Alliance & Leicester. AIB's Polish subsidiary has performed well of late, with NCB seeing strength in BZWBK's share price as one reason for setting a price target of €22.50 for AIB.

Elsewhere, Kingspan provided a talking point after shares surged by 4 per cent, or 53 cent, to €13.71. The move came amid chatter of an imminent deal for the Cavan-based company.

Grafton posted more modest growth, rising by five cent to €11.20 in advance of Monday's agm. Analysts expect a trading update to confirm solid trading at home and softer recent trading in the UK.

Irish Continental Group had a good day, gaining 10 cent to finish at €11.30. Merrion pointed out that a planned extension to the rebate system for PRSI would provide a working capital cash inflow of roughly €4.7 million for the company. Ryanair also moved higher, as oil steadied and the dollar fell. Shares in the airline rose by 10 cent to €6.95.

C&C added one cent to close at €6.30 in advance of Tuesday's full-year numbers. The market is expecting good news on the UK cider market.

CRH climbed by 21 cent to €28.84 on fairly low volume. Uniland, the Spanish firm in which CRH purported to buy a 26.3 per cent stake, has reiterated its confidence in opposing the deal at court.