Boosted by Davy's bullish report, Smurfit shares powered ahead for the second successive day and in heavy trading on the Dublin market closed up 15 cents on the day on €2.70 (£2.13).
Davy's Joe Burnell is looking for a price of €3.25 by year-end and given the current demand that seems a reasonable target, although the shares still have a long way to go to reach the €3.52 achieved immediately after the Stone merger. Still, compared to the €1.45 of early this year, the shares have come a long way.
Otherwise it was pretty thin stuff on the market and one of the few highlights was a 40 cent fall to €9.10 (£7.17) by Ryanair. Profit-taking after the recent surge is the reason for the sharp fall in the shares, and one of the main profit-takers has been Ryanair director James Osborne, who sold 200,000 shares at €9.476 for a handsome profit of almost £1.5 million.
There was little movement among the leaders, with AIB up 10 cents on €13.80 (£10.87), Bank of Ireland unchanged on €16.70 (£13.15) while CRH was also unchanged on €17.70 (£13.94).
After gaining 10 cents on Thursday, James Crean lost 10 cents yesterday to €1.05. Fyffes was 3 cents firmer on €2.18 (£1.72) ahead of Monday's interim figures while Glanbia edged 3 cents firmer to €1.30 (£1.02). Kerry continued to rise in small volumes, closing up 20 cents on €12.40 (£9.77).
The main interest on Nasdaq was in software group Saville, which rose another $1/2 to $163/4 by the time the Irish market closed with talk in the market of a bid for the group. Trading in Saville shares and options has been heavy, and there is a growing view that a bid may be in the offing.
