The MSE Equity Price Index erased Wednesday's decline of 0.12% as it rebounded by 0.3% to a near two-month high of 4,510.887 points. Overall, the gains in the share prices of GO, HSBC, BOV and MIA outweighed the declines in RS2, MaltaPost and FIMBank.
Just over half of Thursday's trading activity took place in the equity of Bank of Valletta plc which recaptured the €1.83 level (+0.5%) across 73,749 shares.
Within the same sector, HSBC Bank Malta plc added 1% to the €1.97 level on volumes totalling 41,923 shares. Shareholders as at close of trading on Friday March 9, 2018 will be entitled to receive a total net dividend of €0.0806 per share.
Also among the large companies by market capitalisation, GO plc was the best performing equity on Thursday with a gain of 1.1% to the €3.54 level after opening at a low of €3.48 (-0.6%). A total of 5,070 shares traded. On Thursday morning, the quad-play telecoms operator announced that it exercised the right to acquire the remaining 49% of the issued share capital of Kinetix IT Solutions Ltd that it previously did not own. Accordingly, GO will now be the sole shareholder of Kinetix.
A single deal of just 995 shares lifted the equity of Malta International Airport plc 0.4% higher back to the €4.96 level. Shareholders as at close of trading on Wednesday April 4, 2018 are entitled to receive a final net dividend of €0.07 per share.
In contrast, RS2 Software plc slipped by 0.8% to its 28-month low of €1.28 across 4,600 shares. On Wednesday, RS2 announced the appointment of Daniela Mielke as the chief executive officer of RS2 North America. Ms Mielke’s career spans more than 25 years in global management roles with more than 15 years in payments and related Fintech. Prior to joining RS2, Ms Mielke was chief strategy and product officer at Vantiv Inc. (now WorldPay) which is the largest US merchant acquirer. In the past, Ms Mielke served also as vice-president of strategy at PayPal Holdings Inc. as well as senior vice-president of strategy at Visa International.
FIMBank plc lost 1.6% to an over two-month low of $0.61 across 12,000 shares whilst MaltaPost plc retracted by 1.5% to the €1.92 level albeit on just 2,575 shares.
The RF MGS Index extended the recent positive momentum as it gained 0.14% to an over two-week high of 1,111.156 points. Eurozone sovereign yields drifted lower (bond prices gained) despite encouraging results from surveys gauging the level of confidence among purchasing managers in the manufacturing sector in Germany and across the whole of the single currency area. Moreover, the unemployment rate within the eurozone remained at its multi-year low of 8.6% in January.
Stock markets are volatile and subject to fluctuations which cannot be reasonably foreseen. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results.