The Irish market notched some solid gains, boosted by the overnight positive trading comments from Dell Computer and the positive reaction on European markets. Irish technology shares on overseas markets rose strongly but most of them are recovering from a very low base and have a long way to go to regain last year's lofty heights.
Turnover on the domestic market was pretty modest. Most of the leaders closed up on the day although off earlier highs. Among the banks, AIB was 20 cents higher on €11.40, Bank of Ireland gained 20 cents to €9.30 while Anglo Irish gained 13 cents to €3.23.
Partly boosted by an upgrading by Goldman Sachs, CRH rose 20 cents to €18.10. Goldman has given CRH an "outperform" tag and set a price target of €20.80 for the shares. Goldman has forecast earnings growth of 15 per cent this year and 20 per cent next year for CRH, well ahead of the 6 and 8 per cent forecasts for Holderbank. Ryanair traded as high as €11.00 before closing up 88 cents on €10.76, ITG was unchanged on €6.25 as it issued 449,000 new shares in deferred payment for the TTMS acquisition, while the resumption of Irish racing boosted Power Leisure 17 cents to €3.15.
In London, Baltimore was 11p higher on 75p sterling. Baltimore has been given a much-needed boost by the disclosure that Fidelity has been a recent big buyer of the shares. Fidelity disclosed that it now has 21.1 million shares or 4.12 per cent indicating that it has bought almost five million shares in the past three weeks.
