Even though profit-taking dragged the FTSE back 21 points and the New York market went nowhere in its first few hours, strong demand for the financial shares drove the Irish market to another new high. How much further the market can go without stimulus from outside remains to be seen, but with few sellers around there is no obvious reason for the market to weaken.
Bank of Ireland continued its recent stunning run and dealt up more than 9 1/2p to a new closing high of 880p, after hitting 882p in earlier trading. AIB was 6p higher on 621p.
Anglo Irish also hit a new high of 110p, up 1p in the day, while Irish Permanent jumped 10p to 670p. The only financial to actually fall was Irish Life, which was down 2p to 364p. IFG - which has replaced Davy as its broker with NCB - was unchanged on 55p.
Industrials were mixed with Smurfit up 2p to 232p. Meanwhile, CRH eased 1p to 798p after reaching 803p in early trading.
Golden Vale was 1p higher on 76p with turnover of more than £12 million. Discounting for double-counting, this suggests that five million shares traded yesterday - almost 5 per cent of the total equity.
Avonmore/Waterford was 2p higher on 277p, while Kerry eased 3p to 822p. Demand for Kerry, which has sent the share rocketing in recent days, is due to a number of factors including post-results' briefings with investors, end-of-quarter position-building and, not least, the Dalgety situation.
