The share index erased some of yesterday’s declines as it rebounded by 0.28% to 4,652.167 points. Four equities closed the day in positive territory, two trended lower whilst HSBC maintained the €2.05 level across 54,125 shares.

Santumas Shareholdings climbed by 6.1% to a fresh all-time high of €1.85,7 across two deals totalling 4,420 shares.

Malta International Airport recaptured the €4.12 level (+0.2%) across 5,570 shares.

Low trading activity took place in the equities of PG and International Hotel Investments. The former advanced 1.2% to the €1.29,5 level whilst the hotel chain operator regained the 62c level (+3%). IHI shareholders as at June 27 are entitled to a three for 100 bonus share issue.

Bank of Valletta continued to trade within a tight range as it eased by 0.2% back to the €2.18,5 level on volumes totalling 42,096 shares.

Malita Investments also performed negatively with a drop of 0.7% to the 73c5 level across 63,900 shares.

Following the minimal declines suffered in the previous two days, the RF MGS Index jumped by 0.22% to a fresh near five-month high of 1,134.680 points.

The gap between the 10-year and 20-year benchmark German Bund yields over the corresponding Italian and Spanish yields widened.

Whilst the German yields trended lower, those of the two largest peripheral countries gained notably.

Yesterday evening, the US Federal Reserve raised interest rates for the second time in three months to a range of between 1% to 1.25%, despite signs of weak inflation recently.

The world’s most influential central bank also indicated its intention of slowly starting to reduce its holdings of bonds and other securities this year.

Meanwhile, the Bank of England left its monetary policy unchanged albeit three members of the Monetary Policy Committee voted against the central bank’s decision.

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