The MSE Equity Price Index resumed its upward trend as it added 0.18% to an over-two-week high of 4,441.331 points. Four equities advanced, including GO and Farsons, while BOV continued to slide to a fresh multi-year low.
Activity was mainly concentrated around GO and PG, with volumes exchanged in these two equities representing almost 60% of the total value of equities traded.
GO plc advanced 0.5% to the €4.26 level (the highest since September 2006) across 34,000 shares. The telecoms operator is due to publish its 2018 annual financial results on Friday March 8. The directors will also consider recommending a final dividend to shareholders at the company’s annual general meeting.
Simonds Farsons Cisk plc surged by 3.1% to regain the €8.25 level across 8,975 shares.
Mapfre Middlesea plc also ended the day higher at the €1.95 level (+1.6%) on a total of 8,624 shares.
In the property segment, Trident Estates plc climbed 4.6% to the €1.36 level albeit on trivial volumes.
In contrast, Malta Properties Company plc and Malita Investments plc eased around 1% to €0.52 and €0.91 respectively, also on insignificant volumes.
The equity of Bank of Valletta plc continued to ease as it declined by another 0.8% to a fresh multi-year low of €1.26 across 74,413 shares.
Also among the large companies, RS2 Software plc (€1.47), International Hotel Investments plc (€0.60) and Malta International Airport plc (€6.30) closed unchanged on light volumes.
Similarly, MaltaPost plc retained the €1.27 level on just 916 shares.
Conversely, PG plc remained at the €1.33 level after failing to hold on to intra-day high of €1.37 (+3%) on robust activity totalling 115,475 shares.
The RF MGS Index added 0.05% to an over eight-month high of 1,105.536 points as sovereign bond yields in the eurozone remained largely under downward pressure following the outcome of this week’s US Federal Reserve monetary policy meeting. In contrast, Italian bonds fell (yields rose) after preliminary data showed that the country entered into a technical recession in Q4 2018.
Stock markets are volatile and subject to fluctuations which cannot be reasonably foreseen. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results.