With international markets resuming their downward plunge, the Irish market once again fell sharply although the ISEQ managed to confine its losses to 1.5 per cent - a good performance given the 3 per cent fall in London and the 5.5 per cent fall in Paris after the Alcatel profits warning.
Where the market goes will depend on Wall Street's overnight performance, but one dealer warned that equity markets right now are "shark-infested waters", not to be dipped into by the unwary.
Those warnings have been ignored by many private investors in recent weeks, and it is understood that £130 million and possibly as much as £150 million has been put into the market in the past few weeks, with many punters trying to make a quick turn on a market where 2 and 3 [N O]2 per cent daily swings are now commonplace.
Yesterday's trading in Dublin largely involved private clients although dealers said that there were some buyers for the banks and CRH in early trading before the market turned downwards. CRH fell to a low on the day of 820p before eventually closing down 38p on 839p - a reasonable performance given the carnage in the British building materials sector after very poor results from RMC.
Among the banks, AIB dealt to a low of 870p before closing down 24 3/4p on 885p, while Bank of Ireland had a volatile day, trading up to £10.81 in early trading, then falling as low as £10.55 before closing up 10p on the day on £10.70. Irish Life's half-year results did not go down too well with the market especially the cautious comments about the second half of the year, but the share recovered from a low of 425p to close down 9p on the day on 434p.
Elsewhere, Arcon was unchanged on 19p ahead of results on Monday and a Nasdaq listing for the shares. Clondalkin fell another 10p to 465p and continues to underperform a falling market - this has led to speculation that the print and packaging group, now trading at less than 8.5 times forecast 1998 earnings, could become a bid target.
Fyffes was 3p lower on 120p, leading to speculation that the company - which bought back more than five million shares at 127p two weeks ago - might use more of its surplus cash to buy back more stock. Golden Vale lost 2p to 96p, Greencore was 10p lower on 285p, while Jones was 20p higher on 200p.
Smurfit remained marooned on 103p with no sign of a recovery with JS Corp shares down $5/8 on $10 1/4p. More worries over Wedgwood's Far East exposure left Waterford Wedgwood shares 3p lower on 63p.
Irish technology shares suffered in line with the weakness on the Nasdaq market and CBT was trading $2 lower on $32 1/4, just above its recent low and way off the near $60 level of last week. Iona was $1 1/8 lower on $22 1/2, Esat lost $3/8 to $31 3/8, while Elan was almost $1 lower on $62 3/4 p. Ryanair was $5/8 lower on $34 7/8, but has survived the Nasdaq carnage better than the technology stocks.
