Pressure on banks drags stocks lower
Bank chips remained under heavy pressure on the Athens stock exchange on Monday as talk of a Greek debt restructuring continued, pushing prices local share prices lower at the start of the week.
The Athens Exchange (ATHEX) general index ended at 1,427.49 points, declining by 2.83 percent from last Friday?s close at 1,469.03 points. The blue chip FTSE/ATHEX 20 index contracted by 3.70 percent to end at 645.56 points.
The banks? sectoral index closed at 1,084.95 points, the lowest in 14 years, shedding 5.67 percent on Monday.
ATEbank led the losers with a decline of 7.69 percent, followed by Alpha Bank (7.49 percent), Piraeus Bank (7.20 percent), Hellenic Postbank (6.89 percent) and Viohalco (6.08 percent).
All but two blue chips headed south, with Public Power Corporation (up 1.42 percent) and Coca-Cola HBC (0.31 percent) being the exceptions.
In total, 29 stocks moved up, 118 went down and 38 remained unchanged.
Turnover came to 91.5 million euros, down from 106.1 million last Friday.
