City: Take stock as Lamont cuts and runs

AS THE dust settles on Tuesday's 1 percentage point cut in interest rates, it looks increasingly as if the Government has fouled up yet again. The initial stock market reaction was euphoric; then came the leader comments, the considered analysis and the sneaking suspicion that perhaps it was not such good news after all - more a panic reaction by ministers to the underlying bad news that recovery is proving as elusive as ever.

Certainly, that is still the view of many leading industrialists. There are many reasons for feeling more confident, most say, but little sign of anything meaningful. Add to that the enormous demands that are going to be made on the stock market over the next year by the Government and the corporate sector and it adds up to a pretty gloomy outlook for share prices.