Still lots of speculation over whether Elan is the interested party involved in talks with British pharmaceutical group Medeva. At this stage, while some analysts query the logic of such a link-up, the prevailing view is that the Irish company is much enamoured of Medeva's distribution capacity and is willing to pay the 200p a share that Medeva set as its bottom line.

One Irish investor who may do very well from a buyout of Medeva is Irish Life Investment Managers which holds just under 5 per cent of the equity. Although Irish Life hedged its bets a bit this week by selling 250,000 shares at 171p sterling, it will get almost £34 million sterling for its Medeva stake if the British group is bought out at the suggested 200p a share.

It is difficult to know how much of that £34 million would be profit, given Medeva's dismal performance over the past two years. But Irish Life should at worst cover any losses and at best make a killing if it bought into the shares in the past year.