The ISEQ is trading 100 points lower at lunchtime today with weakness evident across all sectors.
Volume was low on the Dublin market this morning as investors maintained their cautious stance at the beginning of the second quarter.
Financial stocks succumbed to some profit taking after last weeks rebound. Bank of Ireland accounted for almost a third of the ISEQ's fall today, down 45 cents to euro 9.15. AIB is off 10 cents at euro 11.30 while IL&P is down 10 cents to euro 12.20.
CRH gained 2 cents to euro 18.02 after stronger than expected new construction data in the US was published yesterday. CRH is also under the spotlight after its euro 1.1 billion rights issue ended in chaos when its appointed share registrar, Capita, underestimated the number of shares taken up in the issue.
Baltimore Technologies suffered another hefty fall today after its sector peer Entrust warned of an earnings shortfall. Baltimore shares fell 15p to 70p in London this morning, a fall of 17.6 per cent.
In London technology issues came under renewed selling pressure after another round of profit warnings from the US.
That led to a slide in the software sector, with CMG down 9.6 per cent, Sage Group 8.4 per cent and Logica 7.5 per cent.
Marconi, the telecoms equipment maker, was down 6.9 per cent after its French rival Alcatel said it was cutting nearly 5 per cent of its US workforce.
British Airways was down 5.7 per cent after Alitalia, the Italian national carrier, reported a full-year loss that was bigger than analysts had anticipated
