SHARE prices drifted lower in Dublin in line with the weaker tone in London and despite the firmer opening on Wall Street. Price movements were, however, insignificant, and despite the 12 point fall in the ISEQ the market is under no major selling pressure.
Corporate news was thin on the ground and the announcement of an $87 million acquisition by Bank of Ireland's Citizens Financial associate in the US had no impact on the share, which closed unchanged on 509p.
AIB was 2p firmer on 393p, Irish Life was 1p easier on 269p while Irish Permanent - which has raised £150 million sterling in a tightly priced floating rate note - reached a new high of 472p before closing up 1p on the day on 471p.
Woodchester was unchanged on 215p - the group has disclosed that just over half of its shareholders, including Credit Lyonnais, have opted for a scrip interim dividend in lieu of cash. This means that an additional 2.35 million Woodchester shares are being issued to cover the scrip.
There was little activity in industrials, with CRH down 1p on 636p while Smurfit was unchanged on 169p. The takeover fizz has gone out of Anglo Irish shares, which closed down 2 1/4p on 70p.
IAWs did not trade from its overnight 175p as the group disclosed that 11.9 million plc shares have been transferred from IAWS Society to its shareholders reducing the society's holding in the plc from 60.2 per cent to 49.5 per cent.
Silvermines disclosed that it only got a 27 per cent response from shareholders to its open offer, but the outstanding 12.3 million shares were placed by Riada and Greig Middleton.
Given this sort of overhang, however, it is difficult to see Silvermines shares making much progress from their current 77p despite some recent positive broker comment.
Tullow fell sharply in Dublin and closed down almost 6p to 81 1/2p sterling. The share, however, may have further to fall as it closed down 7p in London on 77 1/2p sterling in heavy turnover of over 5.2 million shares. This is a long way off the 122p sterling high of only a few weeks ago.
