IL&P CHIEF CALM ON MARKETS SLUMP - Irish Life & Permanent this morning reported a 26% rise in pre-tax profits for last year to €529m. Life and pensions profits were up 23%, banking profits up 36%.
Chief executive David Went, referring to yesterday's sharp falls on world stock markets, said the average equity SSIA holders was probably 'all square' for 2007 so far, and had had strong gains over the past five years.
Mr Went said fluctuations on a day-to-day basis were not for long-term pension holders to worry about. He said yesterday was perhaps not as big a disaster as was being portrayed.
On IL&P, he said all areas of its business gained market share, with record life sales and Irish mortgage lending up 37%.
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EIRCOM TO TAKE UP 3G CHALLENGE - Eircom chief executive Rex Comb said the company had decided to accept a 3G mobile licence offered to it by ComReg. He said this gave Meteor the opportunity to provide many more services.
390,000 customers are using Eircom's broadband network, and Mr Comb said the company was happy with the rate of growth off around 4,000 a week.
