Daily Market Highlights (30.05.12)

  • MSE Share Index exceeds the 3,000-points level with a 1.3% rise today to 3,027.324 points, the highest level since 6 February 2012. Today’s increase came about from a 5.9% rise in IHI and smaller gains across 4 other equities. Download a copy of the Equity market summary here.
  • On the local bond market, the Rizzo Farrugia MGS Index edged marginally higher to 989.406 points as the Central Bank of Malta adjusted the bid prices upwards for the medium and long dated paper. Internationally, Eurozone 10-year yields touched a new all-time low of 1.317% earlier on today. This morning the European Central Bank rejected the possibility that Spain will recapitalize Bankia bank through ECB funds. Borrowings costs in Spain and also Italy continued to rise following this news and the results of an Italian bond auction this morning. Spanish 10-year bond yields hit a fresh euro-era high of 6.71% with Italy’s yields at 6.13%.
  • Share price of International Hotel Investments plc up 5.9% to a 14-month high of €0.90 on volumes of just under 60,000 shares.
  • Bank of Valletta plc continued to recover from its low of €2.05 of last Monday with the share price advancing by 1% today to €2.08 on activity of 8,421 shares
  • Equity of Lombard Bank edged 0.4% higher to €2.26 on a single trade of 450 shares. Meanwhile shares of the bank’s subsidiary, MaltaPost were the worst performer as the equity retreated 3.2% to €0.92 on a single trade of 5,000 trades. The postal operator recently published its half-year results revealing a significant drop in profitability to €0.5 million mainly due to a change in tariffs by the Universal Postal Union (UPU) which led to a considerable increase in direct mail costs.
  • HSBC also ended the day lower as the equity touched an intra-day 37-month low of €2.48 but recovered to €2.499 on fresh support.
  • GO’s equity continued to recover from its all-time low and gained a further 1% to €0.899 on volumes of 5,600 shares.