SHARE prices continued to drift lower, with the weakness in London and New York mostly responsible. Dealers see little support for the Irish market coming from London until the British budget is out of the way. while the warnings from technology stocks such as Seagate and Gateway may prevent any support coming from Wall Street in the short term.

As usual, the leaders were the most active and took the brunt of selling pressure. Bank of Ireland is going through a pretty volatile period and fell 8p yesterday to 709p, while AIB was 3p easier on 510p.

CRH came back from its Monday all time high and closed 10p on 695p, while Smurfit - which has been the focus of some bullish talk from US analysts in recent weeks was 1p lower on 192p as associate JS Corp lost 31 cents to 517.06 on Wall Street.

Second liners were mixed and Greencore trading ex dividend - lost 11p to 332p, while Irish Life - which detailed plans to link up with the South African investment group Fedsure - was 4p easier on 346p.

Powerscreen - the favourite Northern Ireland share on the Irish market - was 15p higher on 721p. Ryanair was 6p lower on 320p but was well supported at that level.

Bonds were marginally easier in thin trade for a variety of reasons - one being the lukewarm response to the £80 million auction on Tuesday, where the stock on offer was barely one and a half times subscribed.