With benign US inflation figures suggesting that the Fed will hold interest rates at current levels, technology shares put in a strong performance with some market players suggesting that the markets may be in for a renewed movement from "old economy" into the "TMT" telecom, media and technology shares.
It might be a bit premature to make such a call, but there was no doubt but that there was some strong demand yesterday for technology shares, with the rest of the market going nowhere. The Irish market - low on technology stocks - was marginally firmer but turnover was pitiful with not a single stock trading more than one million shares.
Baltimore was the star of the techies, jumping 59p in London to £6.21 sterling in volume of over 10 million shares, although those gains were not matched on Nasdaq where the share was only marginally firmer in lunchtime trading. Parthus jumped 13p to £2.07 sterling and was also firmer on Nasdaq.
Trintech was another in strong demand. It dealt up €2 to €24 on the Neuer Markt and was trading $1.87 higher on Nasdaq on $22.37. Iona was up $1.50 on $80.25 while Smartforce was marginally firmer.
On the home market, the successful MBO for Adare at €11.46 a share was the only talking-point. The price might seem high given where Adare was trading a few months ago, but there are many who believe that the current malaise in the small/mid-cap sector presents rosy opportunities for managements to take companies private.
Barely noticed on Thursday was a disclosure by Yeoman that it has increased its stake in Ardagh from 15.1 per cent to 19.1 per cent. This gives Yeoman and Mercury Asset Management almost 51 per cent of the equity and will surely stoke speculation that Ardagh - trading at just four times forecast 2000 earnings - may also be taken private.
