Unfazed by the 2.33 percent drop sustained by the banks index on Monday, most stocks ended the opening session of the week on the local bourse with gains, with the benchmark index edging ever closer to the 1,000-point mark.

The Athens Exchange (ATHEX) general index closed at 969.43 points, adding 0.54 percent to Friday’s 964.19 points. The market’s large-cap FTSE/ATHEX-25 grew 0.28 percent to end at 333 points.

Despite reduced investor interest in the Greek bourse, as indicated by the relatively low turnover registered yesterday, the market posted its fifth consecutive session of gains.

Piraeus led the slide of blue chip bank stocks, giving up 5.37 percent, while Alpha Bank dropped 3.05 percent. The day’s biggest winner was Mytilineos, which added 3.74 percent, followed by toy retailer Jumbo which posted gains of 3.28 percent.

News of telecom giant OTE’s successful voluntary exit program resulted in its stock rising 2.02 percent on Monday, to close at 5.56 euros a share.

In total 102 stocks recorded gains, 70 posted losses and 19 remained unchanged.

Turnover amounted to 54 million euros, down from last Friday’s 65.3 million.