Those shareholders who survived the Eircom experience will be in no mood for the latest Stern Stewart Wealth Added Index.

The index examines the world's 5,069 largest quoted companies and measures which have created the greatest wealth for their shareholders over the five years to last June and which have cost their shareholders the most in destroyed wealth over the same period.

A host of Irish companies feature in the list, led by Elan (ranked 124th). And which company propped up the rest. No, it wasn't Eircom. Worse again, it was Vodafone, the company upon which the beleaguered Eircom faithful now rest their hopes.

According to Stern Stewart, the company destroyed a whopping $144.5 billion of wealth over the five-year period.