ATHEX: Bourse day not for the faint-hearted

No one can claim they got bored watching Thursday's bourse session at Athinon Avenue, as after the 4.55% slump on Wednesday, the fastest in nine months, buyers returned in force on Thursday morning boosted by the central bank's support for Credit Suisse. Suddenly the aggressive buying reversed when the market heard about the ECB's 0.50% rate hike, but toward the end the benchmark re-emerged from the day's lows to close with gains.

The Athens Exchange (ATHEX) general index closed at 1,031.91 points, adding 0.65% to Wednesday's 1,025.22 points. The large-cap FTSE-25 index expanded 0.63% to end up at 2,605.87 points, though mid-caps contracted 0.44%.

The banks index improved 0.83%, as Piraeus earned 3.20%, National augmented 1.18% and Eurobank collected 0.77%, while Alpha gave up 0.75%. Titan Cement grew 2.82% and Aegean Airlines parted with 1.65%.

In total 54...