THE Dublin market recovered from morning lows yesterday to end trading just about in positive territory. Gains by the leading financial stocks were offset by losses among second-liners. An initial downward lurch on Wall Street caused nerves to fray in Dublin and markets across Europe did not recover until the Dow firmed up 30 points later in the afternoon. However, the rally on Wall Street came too late to push the overall index significantly up, according to dealers.
Despite the flat performance of the ISEQ, Bank of Ireland did have a good day after Morgan Stanley raised its rating for the bank from "strong buy" to "outperform". It also forecast that the bank's shares could reach €26.6 (£20.9) in the next few months. Bank of Ireland's subsidiary, ICS Building Society, reported an 8.7 per cent rise in pre-tax profits from £30.8 million to £33.5 million, with increased mortgage lending making the major contribution to the figures.
The upgrade from Morgan Stanley and, to a lesser extent, the ICS results helped push the shares up 50 cents to €18.10 (£14.25), said dealers. AIB, in high volumes of trading, rose from €14.55 (£11.46) to €15 (£11.81).
Other names in the financial sector did not perform as strongly. Irish Life, which announced a 20 per cent rise in embedded value profits to €173.8 million (£136.9 million), closed unchanged at €8.50 (£6.69). Irish Permanent slipped back five cents to €14.10 (£11.10).
One of the most vigorous stocks on the day was glassmaker Ardagh, which continued to enjoy the goodwill generated by its £283 million acquisition of Rockware, the British company. The shares were up 45 cents at €2.45 (£1.93) in strong trading.
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