Market report:THE IRISH market had a mixed day yesterday but managed to finish in positive territory, up 1 per cent at 2,881.73.
In the financial sector, Bank of Ireland slipped almost 2.5 per cent to €1.76, but AIB continued its strong run, albeit at a slower pace.
After gaining 36 per cent over the previous two sessions, the bank added another 1 per cent to its share price yesterday, closing at €1.90.
Elsewhere in the sector, Irish Life Permanent marked down 1.76 per cent to €3.34, compounding a fall of almost 3 per cent in Wednesday’s session.
Meanwhile, Elan climbed more than 9 per cent to €5.58 on the back of speculation that Pfizer may bid for the company.
On the construction side, market heavyweight CRH was down six cents at €17.52, while Kingspan gained seven cents to close at €4.70 and Grafton Group finished more or less flat at €3.07.
Elsewhere, no-frills airline Ryanair put in a strong performance, trading up 2 per cent – more than seven cents – to €3.77.
The main stock-specific news of the day came late in the afternoon when Dragon Oil made an announcement to the stock exchange that it had received a preliminary takeover approach.
The market responded strongly and the stock jumped 11 per cent – almost 43 cents – to €4.30.
Recruitment company CPL Resources also enjoyed a good day’s trading, gaining more than 7 per cent to finish the session just below €1.32.
Greencore was another winner. Its stock finished at €1.27, a gain of 2.42 per cent.
Elsewhere, Paddy Power traded up 2 per cent to €17.34.
Packaging group Smurfit Kappa was out of favour, however, and fell 4 per cent to close at €4.08.
Settlement date: June 10th
