Daily Market Highlights (20.04.2021)

MSE Equity Price Index slips on low volumes

 

The MSE Equity Price Index retracted by 1.5% to 3,835.840 points as five companies ended the day in negative territory whilst only BMIT trended positively. Meanwhile, GO, HSBC and Harvest traded unchanged as overall trading activity contracted further to just €0.05 million. Download a copy of today’s Equity Market Summary.

Lombard Bank Malta plc was the most actively traded equity today as it dropped by 3.1% to the €1.85 level across 13,411 shares. The Bank is due to publish its full-year results on Thursday 22 April.

Within the same sector, Bank of Valletta plc lost 2.2% to the €0.89 level albeit on just 1,089 shares.

BOV’s insurance associate – Mapfre Middlesea plc – plunged 10.2% to the €2.12 level on trivial volumes.

Low trading activity also took place in the equities of Simonds Farsons Cisk plc and Malta Properties Company plc, both of which posted notable declines to €8.05 (-8%) and €0.53 (-3.6%) respectively.

BMIT Technologies plc added 1% to recapture the €0.53 level across 4,000 shares. Shareholders as at close of trading on Thursday 22 April will be entitled to receive a final net dividend of €0.02922 per share.

BMIT’s parent company – GO plc – retained the €3.64 level on a total of 1,500 shares.

HSBC Bank Malta plc (3,000 shares) and Harvest Technology plc (9,200 shares) ended the day unchanged at €0.83 and €1.45 respectively.

The RF MGS Index retreated by 0.22% to a near two-month low of 1,111.665 points as eurozone yields rose to an over one-month high amid positive earnings reports by several European companies. Meanwhile, the EU secured an extra 100 million doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine which will partly offset the delays in the roll-out of the Oxford/AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson solutions. In Malta, data published today by the National Statistics Office showed that the Government registered a deficit of €1.3 billion in 2020 which is equivalent to 10.1% of Gross Domestic Product. As a result, the Government’s total debt increased to almost €7 billion, or 54.3% of GDP.