Troika arrival makes market more skittish
The upcoming arrival of the troika on Sunday is bringing the issue of the year’s fiscal gap back to the fore, and sent jitters through the local bourse on Wednesday as the benchmark declined for the third session in a row.
The Athens Exchange (ATHEX) general index closed at 1,256.52 points, dropping 1.44 percent from Tuesday’s 1,274.94 points. The large-cap FTSE/ATHEX 25 contracted 1.30 percent to 409.43 points.
The benchmark dropped to its lowest level in the last six sessions came after investors displayed reluctance to buy stocks and led the index to its greatest slide in the last 16 sessions, albeit on low trading volume. Not even Deputy Minister for Energy Asimakis Papageorgiou’s statement about the impending deal with Gazprom to lower energy rates managed to sway the market.
Just two blue chips went up, with Eurobank Properties adding 0.25 percent and Marfin Investment Group rising by 0.22 percent, while Frigoglass led the losers with a drop of 5.10 percent and Mytilineos contracted by 3.40 percent.
In total 50 stocks recorded gains, 95 posted losses and 12 remained unchanged.
Turnover remained subdued, totaling 67.8 million euros, up from Tuesday’s 65 million.
