Market Comment - In the Spotlight by Manos Chatzidakis

Market Comment

The bourse benchmark managed to recover most of the losses incurred during Thursday’s session having dropped as low as 966 points, to close at just over the 990-point mark losing 0.37%.

Turnover amounted to 87.1 million euros, down from Wednesday’s 120.7 million.

Banking sector remains in the spotlight as consensus now expects limited capital needs against initial estimates. Investors may keep a waiting stance ahead of official results while the gradual reduction in market turnover in the last three sessions enhances this view. 

¢           In the Spotlight

Greece: The government is extending the solidarity levy by two years, albeit with a 30 percent reduction on the rate imposed over the last three years.

Greece/Tourism: Tourist arrivals grew 15.6 pct to 843,206 in the first half of 2014, compared with the same period last year, Hellenic Statistical Authority said on Thursday. The biggest part of arrivals at 85.4 pct- grew 14.6 pct, while arrivals from the European Union grew 17.7 pct in the January-June period. Tourist arrivals from the UK jumped 33.8 pct, from France were up 15.1 pct, from Holland 32.2 pct, Romania 58 pct, Russia 13.5 pct, Cyprus 29 pct and Bulgaria 12.8 pct, while on the other hand, arrivals from Italy fell 10.2 pct, from Albania 8.0 pct and from Denmark 26.2 pct.  Germany has the biggest participation in tourist arrivals in Greece (11.4 pct), followed by the UK (11.1 pct), France (6.6 pct), Russia (6.1 pct) and Bulgaria (6.0 pct). Tourist arrivals from Turkey grew 5.5 pct and from the US 3.2 pct in the first half of 2014.

Greece/Energy: Greece expects to raise more than 150 million euros from leasing the lignite field in Vevi, during the first 15 years of the agreement, the Environment, Energy and Climate Change ministry said on Thursday. The decision to lease the right to operate the field was signed by Deputy Minister Asimakis Papageorgiou, while the agreement with the contractor, Aktor, will be submitted to Parliament for approval.

In other news RAE announced the return on RAB for IPTO for the period 2015-17. The real pre-tax return is set at 8.5% for 2015, 7.5% for 2016 and 7.3% with the provision for an additional 1.0-2.5% on projects with major importance. Four entities have entered the final stage of the tender that is expected to be concluded by the end of the year.

Banking Sector: The country’s systemic banks were on Thursday given the provisional results of the European Central Bank’s stress tests, and market rumours point to two lenders enjoying capital sufficiency while the other two are believed to have limited and manageable capital needs.

If expectations prove correct and the test results are generally positive for the local credit sector, then the road will open up for the alternative utilization of the reserves of 11.3 billion euros that the Hellenic Financial Stability Fund holds.