Despite rising European markets, the ISEQ tracked the Dow Jones in relinquishing early gains, slipping by 0.4 per cent in late trading yesterday.

The financials absorbed the late shock with AIB closing 12p down at 920p after an intra-day high of 940p, Bank of Ireland, down 33p at £13 and Irish Life, shedding 2p to close at 595p. The other insurance groups were the exceptions, with Hibernian closing 20p up at 770p and Norwich Union gaining 12.5p to 519.5p.

Irish Permanent recovered its opening price of 880p in a late deal while Anglo Irish Bank, gained 1p to 194p.

Elan provided much of the earlier boost, after making an intra-day gain of £3.99, but this was reduced to a £1.35 gain when the price closed at £46.36p.

In London, Powerscreen faced a further set back in its current woes when its share price dropped over 21 per cent to 133.5p after a block of 690,000 shares changed hands at a substantial market discount.

Other main stocks were "slack", one dealer said, with CRH gaining 5p to close at £10.60, Smurfit losing 2p to 245p and Clondalkin shedding 15p to 685p. Among other second-liners, IWP kept up its record-breaking daily jaunt for the third consecutive day, achieving a new high of 467p on the back of the Jeyes Group acquisition, up 2p on the session.

In the Northern Irish stocks, fallout from the success of the Belfast Agreement remains to be seen although fund managers were sceptical that there would be any great surge of interest yet. The electricity group, Viridian, saw two deals, closing at 660p, the same as last week's sterling deal of 573p, while the packaging company, Boxmore, was unchanged.

Powerscreen also took a hit on the ISEQ, dropping 24p or 11 per cent, when it dealt at 191p.

But property company Dunloe, with the Belfast company, Ewart, under its belt, could see some interest in the aftermath of the agreement, according to one fund manager.