The positive news in our view is the dividend... however, the headline net profit looks light.

Profit-taking took hold following recent gains. I believe the lack of any significant local news prevented a further rise in the index.

Although there is always room for improvement, there is good news in the findings. Irish employers are outperforming Europe in many areas of people management and employee engagement and this is a testament to the combined efforts of our HR practitioners, people managers and business leaders.

So far the corporate profit outlook remains positive. I don't hear a lot of companies saying they're going to reduce their profit forecasts because of interest-rate concerns, and that's a positive for the market.

That's the most important thing: juxtaposing our positive vision for the city against Mike Bloomberg, ... He shouldn't profit from this in the least.

The market reflected losses on foreign exchanges. We're waiting for positive news. We did not have any large sellers. I expect the market to recover next week after this week's fall.