After closing lower for the last three trading sessions, the MSE Share Index edged up by 0.22 per cent to 4,424.942 points today, reflecting the gains in the share prices of MIA, BOV, GO and MPC. Meanwhile, the three other active equities all closed the day unchanged. Despite today’s upturn, week-on-week, the local equity index still posted a loss of a mere 0.03%. Trading activity in equities remained encouraging this week as a total of €1.19 million worth of shares changed hands – the third consecutive week that volumes exceeded the €1.0 million mark.
The best performing equity today was Malta Properties Company plc which advanced by 1.9 per cent to the €0.54 level across 20,817 shares.
Three deals totalling 4,048 shares lifted the share price of Malta International Airport plc by 0.8 per cent to the €4.24 level. Today, MIA paid out its recently declared gross interim dividend of €0.0462 (net: €0.03) per share.
Also among the large companies, Bank of Valletta plc and GO plc gained 0.4 per cent and 0.3 per cent to recapture their recent highs of €2.26 and €3.15 respectively on low volumes. Early in the afternoon, BOV announced the resignation of one of its non-executive directors.
Meanwhile, HSBC Bank Malta plc maintained the €1.60 level across 4,693 shares.
Likewise, Medserv plc (18,245 shares) and RS2 Software plc (27,247 shares) traded unchanged at €1.55 and 1.64 respectively.
On the bond market, the RF MGS Index extended yesterday’s gains by a further 0.06 per cent to 1,165.651 points as euro zone sovereign yields continued to ease after the Bank of England yesterday reassured investors about its intention of applying another interest rate cut by the end of this year. Furthermore, the Slovenian ECB Governing Council member Mr Bostjan Jazbec was quoted as saying in an interview that the European Central Bank still has plenty of manoeuvring left in order to continue stimulating the single currency’s pace of economic growth and reach its inflationary target of close but below 2.0%. Accordingly, the 10-year benchmark German bund moved slightly above zero (0.003%) from the 0.03 per cent level yesterday whilst the Italian and Spanish equivalents nudged lower to 1.319 per cent and 1.067 per cent respectively.
Trading activity in the newly issued 2.4 per centMGS 2041 (I) r continued to be particularly robust as another €1.1 million (nominal) changed hands today, pushing the price of this stock by a further 4 basis points to 107.64 per cent after touching an intra-day high of 107.75 per cent– which is significantly higher than indicative bid price quoted by the Central Bank of Malta of 105.26%. During this week, a total of €8.85 million (nominal) changed hands in this security – representing 63.3 per cent of the €14.0 million (nominal) traded across all MGS’s this week.