A subdued end to a stormy year
Trading on the Athens Stock Exchange (ASE) during the last week of the year was subdued, with the composite price index closing on Friday at 2,591.56 points, a rise of 27.35 points, or 1.07 percent, from the previous week’s close. For the whole of 2001, the ASE lost 23.53 percent. There is no session today or tomorrow. Total trading volume reached 509.04 million euros, of which a large part was pre-agreed block trades. The average daily volume of trading in this short week (only three sessions) came to 169.68 million euros. All Financial Times indices gained. The FTSE/ASE-80 of small-caps gained the most (2.65 percent), while the mid-cap and blue chips indices gained 0.99 percent and 0.93 percent, respectively. Most sectoral indices registered gains, with the biggest taking place in non-metallic minerals (3.01 percent), information technology (2.53 percent) and IT solutions/equipment (2.48 percent). The biggest losers were basic metals (1.67 percent) and investment stocks (1.09 percent). Metals firm Halcor and insurance company Phoenix were the most heavily traded stocks, with respective values of 158.4 and 32.6 million euros. What makes matters more difficult for Greece is that Washington is being more supportive of Turkey’s views on the continental shelf and has for the first time adopted Ankara’s view that the Dodecanese should be demilitarized.
