Irish stocks outperform rest of Europe

The Irish stock market outperformed the rest of Europe yesterday, with the Iseq climbing a modest but healthy 122 points to close up almost 1.5 per cent.

A strong performance by most of the financial stocks led the way, with AIB climbing almost 2 per cent to €18.27 and Anglo Irish Bank up 1.2 per cent to €14.12 on volume of 5 million shares.

Irish Life & Permanent was firm after going ex-dividend yesterday on a final dividend rate of 22.5 cent. Shares climbed 2.8 per cent to €18.00 as 2.4 million shares exchanged hands.

Bank of Ireland did not partake in the good day for the banks, however, and fell 8 cent to €13.48 as 9 million shares traded.

Some of the sellers switched their holdings in the stock into AIB, according to one Dublin dealer.

CRH rose 3 per cent to €30.06 thanks to a positive mood in the US building sector, while McInerney soared almost 10 per cent as a result of positive trading in the UK housebuilding sector over the past few days.

Grafton added 34 cent to finish up more than 4 per cent at €8.74, while Kingspan rose 2.65 per cent to €17,06, up 44 cent.

Elsewhere, many of the smaller stocks moved ahead on light volumes, including insurance company FBD (up 3.7 per cent), Independent News & Media (up 2.5 per cent), Paddy Power (up 1.6 per cent) and Ryanair (up 2.5 per cent).

Drinks group C&C, which dropped 3 per cent to €6.10 following some profit-taking, while a downgrade by Goldman Sachs for Greencore led to a 3.3 per cent fall in its share price. The food group shed 15 cent to close at €4.54.

Packaging group Smurfit Kappa failed to make any gains after an investor roadshow did not produce any upgrades and it lost 12 cent, closing at €16.20.