Housebuilder Abbey has reported pre-tax profits of €22.58m for the six months to the end of October, which compares with a profit of €22.32m for the same period last year.

Despite positive news on the construction front the ISEQ fell by 23.16 points to 8275.24 this evening.

The ISEQ index of ended the day above the 7800 mark as it acquired 68.97 points to stand at 7861.95.

Housebuilder Abbey has reported a dip in pre-tax profits for the six months to the end of October 2005.

Today: IIB Bank and the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) publish the results of a survey on consumer debt levels.

The ISEQ index of Irish shares ended the week 44.78 points up on trading today, to 6,524.9.

KINGSPAN shares rose 2% yesterday after the Cavan-based building materials group issued an upbeat statement on recent trading.

THE Irish Stock Exchange’s specialist market for smaller companies will open for business next month, it emerged yesterday.

Housebuilder Abbey has reported interim before-tax profits of €26.12m, down from €28.81m for the same period last year.

SHARES in general were in the red across Europe. Ireland following the trend, shed 15.28 points to 5400.03 as the financials again weighed on the index.

The ISEQ closed down 12 points to 5041 as Ryanair continued to slide and the banks failed to maintain an early morning rally.

The ISEQ was up 47 points, nearly 1%, to 5147 just before 11am boosted by evenly spread gains.

The ISEQ closed up 19 points this evening to 5100 on fairly low volume.

The ISEQ in Dublin closed down 16 points, or 0.31%, to 5284 this evening, on losses in some of the bigger stocks.

The ISEQ was flat this evening at 5,278, slightly dipping into negative territory, down 0.65 points.