The high-flying Irish technology stocks listed on New York's Nasdaq took a battering, as markets from Warsaw to Wall Street headed southward yesterday amid mounting fears about Russia's economic and political crisis.

At home, nearly £2 billion was wiped off the value of Irish shares as the ISEQ index lost more than 200 points to close at its lowest level for six months. In the US, Wall Street plunged by more than 4 per cent but Nasdaq issues and smaller capitalisation stocks suffered most as investors fled richly-priced growth shares, particularly technology companies.

Iona Technology was among the heaviest losers, closing 12 per cent lower, while educational software group CBT and Esat Telecom both lost more than 7 per cent.

In Dublin, financial stocks bore the brunt of the losses with the index of financial shares ending some 5.5 per cent lower while the general share index eased by 3.5 per cent. AIB, which has a stake in Polish bank WBK, dropped 66p to £10.25 while Bank of Ireland shed 75p to £11.60.

However, dealers say that the exposure of Ireland's publicly-quoted companies to trouble spots like Russia, Eastern Europe, Latin America and Asia is limited. Like AIB, Irish Life is involved in eastern Europe through a joint venture in Hungary while firms like CRH, Smurfit and Kerry have small operations in Latin America but analysts say these are small as a proportion of their overall business.

But the toll the Asian crisis is taking on Independent Newspapers became evident yesterday when the company announced a dip in halfyear profits to £34 million from £39 million, mainly due to falling exchange rates in Australia and New Zealand and a near doubling in interest charges. Worries are also growing about other areas of the economy, particularly Ireland's significant meat trade with Russia.

The Minister for Agriculture, Mr Walsh, said he was very concerned about the situation in Russia which is Ireland's largest beef market, taking more than 70,000 tonnes of Irish beef worth £150 million.

"Anything that happens to the economy there would have a kickback in Ireland," Mr Walsh said, adding he was taking measures to address the impact of the rouble crisis on the beef sector. These include seeking an increase in European Union export refunds for beef and live cattle exports to third countries.

IFA president Mr Tom Parlon, who met with Mr Walsh yesterday, said there was significant scope within the GATT limits for a refund increase.