Titan Cement

The slightly increased chances of an agreement between Athens and Greece's lenders, thanks to Eurostat figures and politicians' statements, was reflected in Tuesday's session at the local bourse, with moderate gains for the majority of stocks.

Expectations that the long and arduous negotiations between the Greek government and the country?s creditors may be nearing completion sent Greek stocks soaring on Wednesday, with the market?s benchmark finally passing 850 points and trading volume getting close to 100 million euros.

The European Central Bank?s decision not to accept Greek bonds as collateral for local lenders to gain access to liquidity as of next Wednesday, along with the Greek and German finance ministers? meeting, weighed heavily on the Athens bourse on Thursday. However the 9 percent drop at the start of the session had been reduced to just 3.37 percent by the end.

The momentum created at the Greek bourse on Thursday by the European Central Bank decisions to bolster growth in the eurozone continued on Friday, taking the benchmark close to 1,200 points at the end of a fourth consecutive week of gains. News of a ceasefire in Ukraine also helped.

The local benchmark’s third day of gains on Thursday showed that traders are optimistic Sunday’s elections will not have a significant impact on the country’s financial life, while some expect Fitch to upgrade Greece’s rating on Friday.

Political developments weighed heavily on the Greek stock market on Thursday, leading the benchmark index to register losses that were added to during the closing auctions.

March’s triple witching Friday saw the majority of shares hit by considerable losses on the highest turnover in the last four months.