Index barely moves at volatile session’s close
Stocks fell marginally yesterday on the Athens Stock Exchange (ASE), in a volatile session marked by quite heavy trading. While foreign institutionals continued to buy National and Alpha Bank shares, there was a selling wave, particularly in small-capitalization stocks. The ASE general index closed at 2,960.28 points, a decline of 1.38 points or 0.05 percent. During the session, the index ranged from 2,942.72 to 2,977.39 points. The FTSE/ASE-20 index of blue chips gained 0.24 percent to close at 1,662.71 points, while mid-caps and small-caps declined 0.20 percent and 0.55 percent respectively. Among banks, National gained 2.42 percent to close at 28.08 euros, Alpha rose 1.30 percent to 27.94 euros, and Piraeus Bank gained 0.27 percent to close at 14.70 euros. EFG Eurobank ended unchanged despite trading ex-dividend. Several other blue chips made significant gains. These were Motor Oil (up 1.88 percent to a 52-week high 11.68 euros), Hellenic Technodomiki (1.65 percent to 3.70 euros), Intracom (1.56 percent to 3.90 euros) and CosmOTE (1.01 percent to 14.06 euros). By contrast, Titan, PPC and Coca-Cola HBC lost 2.11 percent, 1.57 percent and 1.55 percent respectively. Of 336 traded stocks, 99 gained, 178 declined and 60 ended unchanged. Turnover reached 205.79 million euros.
