One of the Irish market's living dead, David McKenna's Marlborough, caused a minor tremor on the London market just before Christmas when an undisclosed Irish buyer came into the market with bids for up to 25,000 Marlborough shares.

Since the highly illiquid Marlborough traditionally trades in lots of 500 shares, this quickly led market-makers to jack up their quotes from 13p sterling to 20p. Since markets reopened, Marlborough has risen further to 25p sterling, or €0.40.

It seems that somebody is taking a punt that David McKenna might revive his MBO hopes in the current year.