The parent business behind some of the best-known construction names has suffered a major drop in its share value.

Irish building materials group CRH has lost 6% in value after giving a downbeat outlook about its prospects in the second half of the year.

The conglomerate, which owns Northstone, Farrans and Tyrone Brick in Northern Ireland, said that concerns about the eurozone's debt had added to uncertainty about the pace of economic progress in Europe, while the US's recovery seemed to be slowing.

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Its share prices slumped to close at €16.08 after the interim statement was released and, the building firm, which is the largest company on the Irish stock market, also said it expected underlying sales for the first half to show a 10% drop compared with the same period last year, better than the 14% forecast at its annual meeting in May.

Against this backdrop it now expects that earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation for the seasonally less profitable first half of the year will show a decline of approximately 20% from the €650m registered in the same period a year ago.

The company said that in terms of profit before tax it expected to almost break even for the first half of this year, as a sales drop eased.

The update showed that in the first half of 2010, CRH completed 13 acquisitions at a cost of €133m in the US and Europe, and is investing a further €19m in Yatai Cement as its share of equity funding for two development projects in northeastern China.

(BMcC/GK)