MARKET REPORT - DUBLIN

THE week ended quietly with trading grinding to a halt in Dublin yesterday afternoon

THE week ended quietly with trading grinding to a halt in Dublin yesterday afternoon. The ISEQ was off slightly as a lacklustre day in London was compounded by an uninspired morning session in New York.

Friends Provident has continued to buy Unidare shares, announcing that it has now increased its stake to 1,134,050 shares giving it just over 5.7 per cent of the troubled engineering group. Friends Provident has been upping its stake along with Mr Dermot Desmond's International Investment and Underwriting, which has built up a 5.9 per cent stake in Unidare as well as stake in two other recovery plays Jones and Barlo.

Jones Group reported full year results that were every bit as bad as expected and was unchanged at 205p. The company may he prepared to look at selling off some subsidiaries later this year according to management but, at present there is little cheer for shareholders.

The financial stocks all gave ground, led by Irish Life which reported bumper profits on Thursday. It was off 1p on 253p while Bank of Ireland slid 2p to the sterling equivalent of 416p. AIB, however, was up almost a penny at the sterling equivalent of 319.9p, while Irish Permanent fell 3p to and 373p.

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Smurfit was unchanged at 148p while CRH dropped 4p to 550p.

Kerry Group put on 9p to close at 534p after its dramatic drop in London on Thursday and Greencore closed down a penny at 308p.

John McManus

John McManus

John McManus is a columnist and Duty Editor with The Irish Times