Financial News
Mixed close on MSE
Volatility reigned supreme during the final session of the week at the Malta Stock Exchange as the larger equities closed in opposite directions.
HSBC Bank Malta was the day's top gainer as investors deemed the recent decline in price to be an attractive level at which to buy shares. The day's activity amounted to almost 12,000 shares which were exchanged across 18 trades. This buying activity saw the price rally 13c or two per cent to close the week at Lm6.38.
On the contrary, after weeks of strong demand, Bank of Valletta declined sharply on low volume trading activity. In fact merely 2,453 shares were exchanged across 12 transactions, forcing the price lower by 14c or 2.3 per cent to Lm5.81.
Lombard Bank shares declined by the least permissible amount, as 1,796 shares were exchanged across five transactions. In the mean time a 2.2 percentage intra-day gain for FIMBank was completely eroded as the price closing unchanged at $1.80.
Demand for Maltacom shares remained robust with 17,837 shares being exchanged across 10 transactions with the price losing 0c5 to close the week at Lm1.59c5.
Elsewhere in the market, and on the very same day that the government offering of a second tranche of Malta International Airport shares came to a close, 9,939 shares were transacted in the open market without affecting the previous closing level of Lm1.40.
London lower after Compass allegations
London equities moved lower yesterday as Compass Group lost ground after corruption allegations against its UK divisional chief executive intensified, and the heavily weighted oil sector lost ground as crude prices slipped. The FTSE 100 lost 0.4 per cent to 5,143.2 in the final session of a torrid week and the mid-cap FTSE 250 was harder hit, falling 0.6 per cent to 7,442.6.
Overnight in New York, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1.3 per cent to 10,281.1, while the Nasdaq Composite fell 1.1 per cent to 2,068.11. Wall Street was in the red on Thursday as strong third-quarter results from Coca-Cola and SBC Communications were outweighed by disappointing updates from Pfizer and eBay. European equities fell yesterday after US stocks tumbled in the previous session as weak earnings and fresh fears of rising inflation sparked the latest sell off. By midday, the FTSE Eurofirst 300 was down 0.5 per cent to 1,171.85, while the Xetra Dax in Frankfurt was off 0.4 per cent at 4,845.9. In Paris, the CAC 40 fell 0.5 per cent to 4,369.61.
Tokyo shares rebounded to close higher yesterday, after Toshiba revised upward its half-year earnings forecast. The benchmark Nikkei 225 average closed up 0.07 per cent to 13,199.95, while the broader Topix index closed up 0.1 per cent to 1,385.37.