DEMETRA made its entrance on the stock market at a premium of 16 per cent yesterday as one of the largest listings to date opened at the top end of analysts’ predictions.

BOTH Commerce Minister Nicos Rolandis and Zacharias Ioannides, Director-general of the Cyprus Hotel Association said they were satisfied with yesterday’s "consensus" over re-imposing two old taxes on hotels.

RICHARD A. Boucher, US ambassador to Cyprus 1993-96, has been appointed as spokesman for the US State Department headed by Madeline Albright.

It will be Boucher’s second innings in the job, which he held from 1989 to 1993, but he is confident that the challenges are still fresh.

COMMERCE Minister Nicos Rolandis yesterday said the question of whether or not to upgrade or close the Larnaca petroleum refinery had been deliberated by a special ministerial committee and would go before the Council of Ministers "sometime in May."

Athena Karsera

IT’S a godsend for British tourists and expat pensioners, and a nightmare for Cypriots with children studying in the UK.

Pegged to the plummeting euro, the Cyprus pound is hovering a whisker away from parity with sterling, with the local currency hitting a 30-year low against the British pound on Wednesday.