BOV recovers as small caps decline

During this morning’s trading session on the Borza, the share price of Bank of Valletta plc recovered some of the recent declines with a 2.3% rise to regain the €2.70 level. Fifteen trades totalling almost 23,700 shares were transacted today with further bids unsatisfied at the closing price and lowest offers now placed at €2.73. Investors in the La Valette Multi-Manager Property Fund have until 30 June to reply to the Bank’s offer of €0.75 per share.

On the other hand, 5 equity closed the day lower. FIMBank plc slumped 5.9% to a fresh 74-month low of US$0.80 on high volumes of over 116,000 shares. Shareholders also have until 30 June to submit their acceptance form with respect to the “share-for-share exchange” whereby shareholders will receive shares in the new holding company FIM Holdings plc. This new holding company was set up to improve the tax efficiency of the FIMBank Group.

A small trade of 300 Middlesea Insurance plc shares was transacted at the €1.02 level representing a 0.9% drop from the previous close. Details have still not been disclosed of the acquisition of Munich Re’s shareholding by Mapfre Internacional and the subsequent mandatory bid to all other shareholders.

MIDI plc dropped a further 2.4% lower to a new all-time low of €0.41 on volumes totalling 2,100 shares. Selling pressure was also evident in Island Hotels Group with the equity dropping 5% to a new 6-month low of €0.85 on very low volumes of 400 shares. Following today’s downturn, IHG shares are 15% below the IPO price of €1.00 per share.

MaltaPost plc’s share price slumped 5.6% back to the €1.02 level across two trades amounting to just over 2,000 shares.

During the month of May the MSE Share Index edged marginally higher to 3,350.670 points but still remains 11.4% below its value at the beginning of the year. The best performers in May were Middlesea Insurance plc (+20%) and International Hotel Investments plc (+14.3%). Meanwhile BOV dropped -6.3% during the past four weeks mainly in response to the announcement that the Bank is offering to buy back the shares of the La Valette Multi-Manager Property Fund.

On the bond market, the Rizzo Farrugia MGS Index ended the month of May marginally higher at 976.458 points reflecting the sharp downturn in yields in the latter part of the month as the Eurozone debt crisis was reignited.