Markets share in international surge as US leads good recovery

The Dublin market rebounded yesterday from the heavy losses sustained last week and in line with international markets took its lead from a strong opening on Wall Street.

The admission by President Clinton that he had a relationship with a White House intern had little effect on the markets, with many observers taking comfort from Mr Clinton's television address to the nation.

Meanwhile, London took its own encouragement from new inflation figures which were described as "tame". With the FTSE making its biggest points gain ever, the market in Dublin was not going to be left out.

"We participated in the surge on international markets, although we were not as strong as some other markets," said a dealer.

"Nonetheless, the market is up by almost one per cent which goes someway to repairing the damage of last week when there was just endless bad news from the Far East," he added.

Predictably, the resurgence was led by the financials, with AIB rising 23p to 1120p, although volumes were relatively light. Bank of Ireland, one of the worst victims last week, remained unchanged at 1290p. Irish Life was one of the better financial performers, adding 10p to close at 615p. Irish Permanent, which announces interims next Tuesday, saw its share price go up 10p to 860p, which some will see as a good omen.

The fight back from CRH continued after weeks of price setbacks. In heavy volumes the stock rose from 875p to 896p with buyers creeping back into the market for industrial stocks. This also benefited Smurfit which put on 3.5p to close on 159.5p in healthy volumes.

"Selling is still the name of the game at present, but the buyers are coming back into the market after taking a short break," a dealer said.

Powerscreen's troubles continued as it fell by 20.5p to 90.5p, with some in the market worried about the delay in the announcement of the company's results. It is likely that when the results are released the company will also announce a series of sell-offs of some of its divisions and this will have an impact on the share price too, say dealers.

Ryanair saw its recent upward movement reversed as it shed 22p to close at 538p. Dealers said the drop is not regarded as showing a weakness in the stock, which has been very strong in recent weeks.

Other movers were Green Property, down 5p to 435p, Anglo Irish Bank, up 4p to 182p and Athlone Extrusions, down 2p to 80p.