Stocks shed 0.65 pct, National Bank tumbles again
Equities fell 0.65 percent yesterday as the National and Commercial banks continued to bleed after the government said on Tuesday it would reduce its stake in the two banks. Analysts said investor fears of overhang in two of the country’s largest banks lingered at a time when the market looks weak to absorb a possible extra tranche of bank stocks. «There was a combination of selling pressure from weak European markets and the continued negative effect of Christodoulakis’s comments,» said Costas Zareifopoulos, analyst at Pendethekas Securities. Bellwether National followed up Tuesday’s 2.3-percent slide by losing 2.34 percent to 24.16 euros. Commercial trimmed late session losses of more than 3 percent to end off 0.29 percent at 27.96 euros. The bank subindex lost 1.06 percent while the Athens bourse benchmark general index ended at 2,342.64 points. The FTSE/ASE-20 index of blue chips lost 0.74 percent to 1,265.75 points, while the FTSE/ASE-40 index of mid-caps fell 1.16 percent and small-caps on the FTSE/ASE-80 dropped 1 percent. Turnover was 81.54 million euros on 14.4 million shares traded. (Reuters)
