Trading updates form CRH, Kerry and Eir

A few weeks after earnings season kicked off on Wall Street, a raft of Irish companies are set to give us a look under their bonnets this week.

CRH, by far the largest company on the Iseq, is expected by analysts at Davy to deliver a positive trading update on Wednesday. This may prompt investors to take a more positive view of the stock, which has underperformed peers of late.

Keep an eye out any update in CRH’s full-year outlook, having guided in early March that ongoing growth in the US business should offset a more moribund European market, where Ireland, the UK and the Netherlands stand out as positive exceptions.

CRH, which is notoriously tight-lipped on deals before they are done, is unlikely to give any clarity on its ambitions in India, where it is reported to be among bidders for €1.3 billion of assets being sold by Franco-Swiss rival LafargeHolcim.

Food companies Kerry and Glanbia are both stepping out on Wednesday with interim management statements.

The focus at Glanbia will likely be its performance nutrition business (a purveyor of protein shakes for fitness fans), -which has recently driven some analysts to upgrade the earnings forecasts.

After its shares hit an all-time high above €84 last week, Kerry has since dropped off a bit amid a mixed bag of results from international peers. The company now forecasts 6-10 per cent growth in adjusted earnings per share.

Eir is also set to unveil quarterly figures. Followers of the company will be looking for further signs of revenue improvement, which was all-too-elusive at the time Eir abandoned plans to return to the stock market in 2014.