A group of present and former Eircom staff has raised some €30 million by selling shares in the telecoms company.

Another group of shareholders has opted to hold on to shares recently allocated to them that are worth a similar amount.

The share sales began to take place at the start of this week and are believed to have been completed yesterday afternoon.

About 6,000 present and former workers are understood to have been involved in the sale transactions, which were organised through Merrion Stockbrokers.

This would imply an average cash return of about €5,000 per person, based on a price of €1.97.

Some will have received more than this and others less, according to their allocation under the Eircom share ownership programme (Esop).

The latest sales became possible in late March when the Esop converted a portion of preference shares into ordinary shares.

The average value of the allocation at this stage was roughly €4,000 for each of the 14,500 members involved.

This brought the total value of the shares being distributed to about €58 million.

While about 6,000 of those receiving the stock opted to sell it, the remaining 8,500 appear to have chosen to hold on to their shares.

This became possible under a new system which allows individual Esop members to decide whether to keep or sell stock that is allocated to them. In time, it is expected that Esop members will be able to deal with their broker directly and individually, rather than issuing sell orders through the Esop itself.

The Esop had, until this week, paid out more than €300 million to its 14,500 members since 1999.

The most recent payout to Esop members before this week came just before Christmas, when the average member received €4,000.

Shares in Eircom closed unchanged at €1.97 last night.