Turnover in most of the leading stocks was pretty thin yesterday and price changes were modest. The biggest action was in secondliner Barlo, which fell sharply after reiterating its profits warning.

Almost 1.5 million Barlo shares traded as the share price first fell to a low of #0.67 before recovering in later trading to close five cents lower on #0.75. Another second-liner which suffered a sharp fall was ITG, which dropped another 40 cents to #5.35 as the market prices in the planned #30 million fundraising.

Among the leaders, AIB drifted two cents to #12.42, Bank of Ireland added four cents to #11.19 while CRH was 10 cents lower on #19.40. The biggest volume in the larger capitalisation stocks was in Smurfit where more than 3.8 million shares traded as the stock gained eight cents to #2.35. Golden Vale gained two cents to #1.52 as Kerry's offer period for the company moves into its final week.

On overseas markets, Elan was trading 60 cents higher on $58.25 in midday New York trading while bargain-hunters moved into Iona and drove the share - which has fallen from $30 a week ago - up $2.30 to $19 by midday. Trinity Biotech benefited from its good second-quarter results and was trading six cents higher on $1.66. In London, AIM newcomer Alltracel remained out-of-sorts and lost 3p to 44.5p sterling while Parthus recovered slightly from recent weakness and was 3p higher on 52.5p sterling.