There was no question about the main event yesterday - the biggest ever fundraising carried out on the Irish market through the #1.1 billion rights issue from CRH. Add in more excellent corporate results from Waterford Wedgwood, IAWS and FBD and it was a good day for stocks at least in terms of news flow.

Some in the market were taken aback by the scale of the discount in CRH's rights issue and certainly the 49 per cent discount on the previous close of #20.44 was a bigger discount than this reporter can ever remember in any Irish share issue.

But the size of the discount means that there is likely to be a rush among CRH investors to take up their rights although some Irish holders who are on a mandate to reduce their Irish exposure may resist the temptation. Dealers expect heavy two-way trading in the nil paid rights in the coming weeks.

For the rest of the market, however, the scale of the CRH cash call has implications and it is likely that many CRH shareholders may sell other shares to generate cash to take up their rights.

Needless to say, CRH shares fell from the overnight #20.44 to a low of #18.40 before closing on #19.05. But when the shares are adjusted for the rights issue, CRH closed almost 60 cents higher than the ex-rights price of #18.38 - an indication of the demand for the stock that is likely to be there until the CRH cash call has cleared the market.

Elsewhere, there was solid trading in Eircom and the stock closed 12 cents higher on #2.52 as Vodafone finally broke out of the 180-190p trading range to close almost 10 per cent higher on 2081/4p sterling. The market gave an enthusiastic response to IAWS's expansion into North America and pushed the shares up 95 cents to #7.90. Volume in the stock, however, was very small and the shares might drift from last night's closing level. FBD jumped #1 to #5 but again on minuscule volumes - just 11,000 shares.

Technology shares recovered some ground although Baltimore and Trintech remain pretty washed-out. Baltimore took the unusual step of clarifying the lock-up arrangements involving the former Content Technology shares, as unfounded speculation that 27 million of these shares would hit the market this week was one - and only one - of the reasons for the current weakness in the shares.