The MSE Equity Price Index shed 0.65% to 4,325.432 points on Tuesday, largely reflecting the declines in BOV, HSBC, RS2 and GO which outweighed the gains in three other shares. Meanwhile, PG and Farsons closed the day unchanged. Overall trading activity remained healthy as €0.44 million worth of shares changed hands.
Bank of Valletta plc lost 1.7% to close at its six-year low of €1.45 on heightened activity totalling 138,617 shares.
Within the same sector, HSBC Bank Malta plc shed 1.7% to the €1.72 level albeit on just 2,469 shares.
GO plc eased by 1.1% from its 2018 high of €3.60 to the €3.54 level across 42,095 shares.
RS2 Software plc moved back to the €1.18 level (-1.7%) on two deals totalling 9,873 shares.
Mapfre Middlesea plc also performed negatively today with a decline of 1.1% to the €1.83 level across 7,892 shares.
A single deal of 4,000 shares forced the equity of Main Street Complex plc to a new low of €0.64 (-0.8%). On the other hand, both MIDI plc and Malita Investments plc trended higher to €0.565 (+0.9%) and €0.87 (+2.4%) respectively albeit on shallow volumes.
Malta International Airport plc added 0.8% to regain its all-time high of €6.05 on activity totalling 2,249 shares.
Meanwhile, PG plc held on to its 2018 high of €1.40 across 12,000 shares.
Simonds Farsons Cisk plc also traded unchanged at the €7.55 level across 1,243 shares. Today, the equity traded without the entitlement to a net interim dividend of €0.0333 per share.
On Wednesday, Trident Estates plc is due to publish its interim financial results for the six-month period ended 31 July 2018. The equity remained inactive today.
Monday's rebound in the RF MGS Index was short-lived was it slipped by 0.2% today to a fresh four-year low of 1,084.755 points. Eurozone sovereign yields remained sharply higher amid encouraging comments made yesterday by ECB President Mario Draghi related to inflationary expectations. Movements in yields were also influenced by the recent strong rise in the price of oil (reflecting supply concerns) as well as anticipations that the US Federal Reserve will tomorrow indicate further monetary policy tightening in the months ahead.