ISEQ closes up 18.77

The ISEQ index of Irish shares closed up 18.77 points at 5241.15 on a busy day for a number of major players.

Food stock group IAWS was up 1c at €9.29, after appointing a new chief executive and a new commercial director. It was, however, IAWS’ food rival Kerry that was the biggest mover on the exchange, going up 42c, or 2.5%, to €17.42.

Donegal Creameries also showed significant gains, up 20c, or 4.4%, to €4.70.

The company announced today that it is to create Europe's largest mushroom company with the merger of its Carbury Mushrooms with Connacht Gold Co-Operative Society and Monaghan Middlebrook Mushrooms Limited.

It was a mixed day for the financials, with Irish Life & Permanent performing best, up 18c at €12.57.

Bank of Ireland, having launched a new financial package for the franchising sector, closed up 8c at €10.27. Anglo was down 7c at €12.70, while AIB was still in the news for all the wrong reasons, closing down 1c at €12.02.

Low-fares airline Ryanair closed up 11c (2.5%) at €4.45, as the war of words between Michael O’Leary and the TEEU over the proposed break-up of Aer Rianta continued.

Building materials group CRH closed down 9c at €17.06, after being downgraded from ‘outperform’ to ‘neutral’ by Credit Suisse.

Waterford Wedgwood dropped 1c (2.5%) to close at €0.18, after issuing a profit warning influenced by tough trading conditions in Germany. Earlier, the group announced that it is to sell its US-based cookware subsidiary All-Clad for $250m (€203m).

The FTSE closed up just one point at 4422.8.