Shares soar on highest volume since reopening
By Hamza Hendawi
SHARE prices rose yesterday to their fifth successive record close. At £31.77 million, volume was the highest since the market reopened for business on October 4 after a four-week closure.
The all-share index closed at 543.51, up 2.40 per cent on Wednesday’s close.
The banks carried the day as usual with dealing in their titles accounting for more than 50 per cent of trade. The Bank of Cyprus, the market’s locomotive, is fast closing on its pre-closure levels of £13- plus, finishing the day up 26 cents to close at £11.85. The bank’s 1999- 2003 warrants was also up, by 42.50 cents, to close at £9.78.
Interest in the Bank of Cyprus titles were boosted by news on Wednesday night that the bank was expecting to list on the larger Athens Stock Exchange by February or March next year. An extraordinary meeting of shareholders on Wednesday night also ratified a proposal to waive their right to participate in a new rights issue scheduled for later this year in Greece to meet Greek requirements for an Athens listing.
The Popular Bank, fast approaching its pre two-for-one share split in the summer, notched up 39.50 cents to close at £12.37, while its 1993-1999 warrants appreciated by 62 cents to close at £21.50.
Trading in the two banks’ titles, together with the small Universal Bank, accounted for about 53.0 per cent of trade, or £15.04 million. The banks’ share of the market is likely to be boosted today, when the Hellenic Bank returns to the market after its four-for-one split. Hellenic’s fully-paid shares were last traded on September 3, which is also the day before the market closed for a month to allow brokerages to clear a backlog of administrative work. The share closed on that day at £15.42, but traders expect it to open today at as high as £5 apiece.
The traders believe Hellenic’s fundamentals are slightly weaker than those of the Bank of Cyprus and the Popular Bank, but that it will gain in value so long as the market’s bullish run continues unabated.
This bull run has sent share prices soaring by nearly 500 per cent since the start of the year.
Nicos Shacolas, meanwhile, announced yesterday in a news conference that his Cyprus Trading Corporation was expected to get a listing on the Athens Stock Exchange around March next year.
He said the company posted half-yearly pre-tax profits of £2.75 million compared to £702,000 in the corresponding period of 1998 on a turnover of £32.71 million, up from £29.75 million.
Separate profits from trading on the stock market, he added, amounted to £35 million. CTC closed 30.50 cents up yesterday to close at £3.40, almost at par with Shacolas’ other retail chain, Woolworth, which closed yesterday at £3.41, slightly down on Wednesday’s close.
Woolworth, also heading for an Athens listing next year, posted a turnover of £20.42 million in the first six months of 1999 and pre- tax profits of £4.35 million. Shares of both Woolworth and CTC have been steadily increasing in value since the market reopened on October 4.
