The Irish stock market gained just 21 points but dealers said there was good activity in most of the leading stocks while Riverdeep successfully placed more than 29 million shares.
The educational software company's non-executive chairman, Mr Pat McDonagh, raised more than €146 million through the successful placing with Irish and other European institutional investors. The shares were placed at €4.97, a discount to the €5.20 to €5.30 price range in which they have traded of late. The stock closed at €5.25, down 10 cents.
Golden Vale also remained a focus for the market in the wake of Kerry Group's €1.37 a share offer for the Cork-based company. The market continues to believe Kerry will have to pay more to complete the deal, with the shares trading between €1.45 and €1.50 for most of the day. They eventually closed one cent lower at €1.46 after heavier-than-usual volumes in the stock.
Kerry shares, however, gave up some ground to close six cents lower at €13.45.
Elsewhere, dealers said financial stocks were in good shape, although they reported some switching out of Bank of Ireland, which has had a good run of late, into AIB. The latter gained 18 cents to close at €12.55 while the former gained just one cent to €10.98.
Dealers said activity in Eircom was subdued after the flurry of recent days, with the shares closing unchanged at €1.27.
CRH had a good day, adding 22 cents to €21.08, while Grafton was another good performer on the day, gaining 14 cents to €3.59.
