The Irish market fell back a little yesterday following sharp falls in London and on Wall Street during European trading. The FTSE dropped more than 100 points at one stage, suffering its biggest one-day loss since March, as Microsoft profits disappointed.

Looking ahead to next week, dealers said attention could switch back to the US where Federal Reserve chairman, Mr Alan Greenspan will deliver his second Humphrey-Hawkins testimony of the year on the state of the US economy.

Dublin dealers added that the financial stocks were likely to come under further pressure on Monday if the Dow maintained its losses at the close of trading.

By the close, the financials had lost only marginal ground following a slide in HSBC in London which had prompted much of the gains earlier in the week.

AIB lost 3p to close at 580p. However, in after hours trading AIB was trading as low as 573p in New York.

Bank of Ireland lost 2p to close at 825p, while Irish Life closed at 370p from 330p sterling and 2 1/2p higher than the previous day's close.

Among leading industrials, CRH closed at 681p from 619p sterling, down 9p on the day. Smurfit put on 3p to close at 224p in a very busy session for the stock.

Waterford Foods, which firmed in the wake of last week's merger with Avonmore, remained unchanged at 160p while Avonmore put on 5p to close at 300p.