Market in third successive record close

By Hamza Hendawi

SHARE PRICES continued to rewrite the record books yesterday, hitting their third record close in as many days on a decent volume worth £12.59 million.

The official all-share index stood at 158.98, 1.36 per cent up on Thursday’s close. The rise took the market’s Monday-to-Thursday gains to 2.50 per cent.

As in previous days, Nicos Shacolas’ CTC and Woolworth had a field day yesterday, while strike-plagued Cyprus Airways saw its shares persist with their mysterious appreciation despite the company’s deepening woes.

The banks did not do too badly either, with Hellenic Bank up by an awesome 18.50 cents to close at £4.40.

Shacolas’ CTC rose by 17.50 cents to close at £2.06 in trade worth £1.17 million. Luck began to smile on the share when Shacolas announced this week that the company planned a two-for-one split and that profits were up by 72 per cent in 1998. Turnover, he said, was expected to increase to £70 million in 1999 from last year’s £66 million.

Shares of Woolworth, the flagship of Shacolas’ retailing empire, went up 5.5. cents yesterday. The stock closed at £0.93 with 1.32 million changing hands at a value of £1.24 million.

Cyprus Airways shares, which often slump into long spells of hibernation, yesterday notched up half a cent to close at 0.67, a new year-high. The share has appreciated by more than 35 per cent over the past week, prompting many brokers to suspect that pilots of the powerful Pasipy union are mopping up shares from the market.

The pilots, who staged a 24-hour strike on Tuesday and began a 48-hour stoppage yesterday over promotions, have publicly stated their wish to acquire 12 per cent of the carrier to earn seats on the airline’s board of directors.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.