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ISEQ in the red as Kerry shares fall

Wednesday, October 31 17:37:44

Profit taking dominated afternoon trading on the ISEQ today after a strong rebound yesterday and after a lacklustre reopening on Wall Street after the big storm and as Kerry Group's shares fell sharply.

At the close, the index was down 1.28 points to 3,255.21.

European stocks dipped, led by heavyweight British oil and gas firm BG Group after it warned it would show no production growth next year. The FTSEurofirst 300 provisionally closed down 0.5 percent at 1,097.54, reflecting weakness on Wall Street, which reopened after a two-day stoppage after super storm Sandy caused widespread damage to the U.S. eastern coast.

Shares in C and C fell 5c to E3.69. In its Q3 results today, ABInbev said its Stella Cidre performaed strongly during the summer, with sales up by almost 80pc in the period helped by its new pear variant. In its main beer businesses ,global, growth was more mundane with organic volumes down 0.3pc mainly driven by a poor performance in eastern Europe. "The performance of ABInbev's cidre over the past year has clearly been at the expense of other players, as evidenced by C and C's Magners lfl volumes which fell 17.4pc in its H1 results to end August. It remains to be seen whether the level of promotion of the Cidre brand continues with the same intensity in the coming quarters when C&C is anticipating more stable volumes from its brand," said Goodbody's Liam Igoe.

Shares in Kerry Group declined 108c to E40.37. Irish food sector giant, Kerry Group, today posted a 12.1pc rise in profits for the first nine months of this year with sales revenues up by 10.9pc to E4.4 billion. Looking to the full year, Kerry said it is confident of achieving its growth targets for the full year and delivering nine to eleven per cent growth in adjusted earnings per share. In line with the business momentum reported at the half year stage, the Group's underlying trading margin performance remained strong in the period, its Interim Management Statement said today.

Shares in CRH climbed 26c to E14.36 and Aryzta gained 70c to E38.40.