The Irish stock market closed nearly 0.7 per cent lower as European markets suffered the fall-out from Tuesday's sharp drop on Wall Street, although dealers said trading volume in Dublin was generally light.

Among the stocks marked down in sympathy with the weak tone overseas were CRH, which closed 45 cents lower at #17.90, and Eircom, which shed 10 cents to #4.61.

In the financial sector, AIB lost 17 cents to #8.50 but Bank of Ireland managed to buck the trend and gain 10 cents to #6.10.

Again, results failed to inspire and Irish Life & Permanent closed unchanged at #8 after releasing figures that were broadly in line with expectations, dealers said.

Food group Glanbia also had a quiet day, despite reporting a drop in profit before tax and exceptionals to #58.5 million (£46 million). The group also became one of the casualties of the review of the FTSE indices, losing its place in the FTSE EuroMid index of mid-sized European shares. Nonetheless, the shares closed just five cents lower at 95 cents.

Among the beneficiaries of the review were Baltimore and Elan and, while the news came too late to affect European trading, it did little to bolster their share prices in the US.

By the close of business in Dublin, Baltimore stock was off nearly 3 per cent while Elan was down more than 2 per cent as the hi-tech sector retreated in the US.

Fyffes, which announced that long-running litigation with Geest had been settled, lost 15 cents to #3.50 while Independent News & Media shed seven cents to #10.93 despite announcing plans to accelerate the introduction of the digital set-top boxes for its Internet service provider, Unison.