Iseq fall prompted by bad day for financials and pharmaceuticals

Dublin's Iseq fell 21 points to 5400.15 today, with financials and pharmaceuticals the main reasons for the fall.

Irish Life and Permanent were the only positive in the financial sector, rising 7c to €12.42, while the remainder recorded double-digit falls. AIB were down 10c to €12.25, Anglo Irish fell 15c to €12.40 and Bank of Ireland slipped 13c to €10.44.

Pharmaceuticals also had a bad day, especially Warner Chilcott who tumbled 57c to €9.68, Elan showing a relativley slight fall of 8c to end at €20.42.

The construction sector tried its best to keep the Iseq up with CRH, Abbey and Heiton all showing rises.

CRH stocks grew 33c to €17.98 after the building materials group said it expects to report an increase in its pre-tax profits for the first half of this year in its trading statement today. The statement said their profits should be €100m ahead of the same period last year, when the results were hit by bad weather.

Abbey also showed a major rise, up 25c to €8.60, while Heiton's rise was more modest at 2c to put the building company at €6.57.

Other major movers for the day all ended in the negative, Iona being the largest as they tumbled 23c to €2.75.

Food companies Glanbia and Kerry were the other big fallers, going down 5c and 10c to finish at €2.60 and €17.20 respectively.

Paddy Power mirrored the trend with a 10c decrease to €9.50.