Building materials group CRH's #350 million (£275 million) bid for Finnish group Addtek still hangs in the balance, CRH chief executive Mr Liam O'Mahony told shareholders yesterday.

"The deal is still on the cards but the vendor has got to see if they want to go through phase two and we want to see what the odds of success are and how is it going to work out," Mr O'Mahony said after an unusually brief annual general meeting yesterday.

The deal ran into trouble with the European Commission's competition regulators shortly after it was announced. The Commission invited submissions from interested parties in early March and launched a formal investigation into the competition implications of the deal shortly afterwards.

CRH is the sole producer of grey cement in Finland after its acquisition of Finnsemennti two years ago. Buying Addtek and its Parma Betonia subsidiary would mean that CRH companies would control the supply of grey cement and would also have a large part of the precast market that uses that cement as one of its main raw materials.

The aggressively acquisitive CRH, which spent #1.6 billion on 60 new businesses in 2000, is cash rich following its one-for-four rights issue in March which raised around #1.1 billion.

Chairman Mr Pat Molloy told shareholders there was good volume growth in Ireland in the first quarter.

Mr Molloy said exceptionally bad weather in Britain had adversely affected housing activity levels and the outlook for that market was flat.