€4.5bn lost in another black day for Irish shares

IT was another black day for Irish shares yesterday which lost about €4.5 billion and saw 4.7% wiped from share values.

Yesterday’s carnage was prompted by further concerns over the extent of the exposure of banks to the high-risk lending (subprime) conducted in the US for the past few years.

That debt is estimated at 200bn, but nobody can be certain of the true figure, said Goodbody Stockbrokers chief economist