Athens Stock Exchange

Bank stocks continued to fall on Wednesday in the wake of a European Central Bank decision that foresees eurozone lenders having to set aside funds to cover 100 percent of loans that turn nonperforming from January 2018. The news reinforced market concerns that, one way or another, local banks will need a fresh cash injection.

Greek bank stocks came under selling pressure on Monday as the possibility of the need for additional provisions looms large. While non-banking blue chips appeared at times as if they would manage to contain the benchmark's drop, the main index ended the first day of the trading week well in the red, with turnover failing to breach the 60-million-euro mark.

The Greek bourse's main index fell 8.46 percent over the month of September while the banks index dropped 22.4 percent. Meanwhile, gains seen during Friday's trading session had all but evaporated by the end of the day.

The Athens Exchange (ATHEX) general index closed at 755.61 points, adding 0.11 percent to Thursday's 754.76 points. On a weekly basis it shrank 2.37 percent.

The Greek stock market's banks index rebounded 10.32 percent on Thursday as traders expressed relief that the International Monetary Fund and Frankfurt had reached an agreement on the Greek credit sector.

The Athens Exchange (ATHEX) general index closed at 754.76 points, adding 2.46 percent to Wednesday's 736.64 points.

Another day of high volatility at the Greek stock market, following Tuesday's considerable ups and downs, saw the closing auctions decide that the majority of stocks would end up in the red on Wednesday, as did the bourse's benchmark.

Greek stocks took a tumble on Monday on the heels of the German election result and ahead of statements by ECB governor Mario Draghi about bringing forward a stress test for local banks.

The Athens Exchange (ATHEX) general index closed at 742.49 points, shedding 4.06 percent from Friday's 773.94 points. The large-cap FTSE-26 index contracted 4.35 percent to end at 1,956.85 points.

The Greek stock benchmark's 1 percent rise on Friday - for the second day in a row - was not enough to avert a fourth week of losses for the bourse, a decline sequence not seen since last January.

After Wednesday's battering, when it lost 21.7 percent, Piraeus Bank shares recovered 9.26 percent on Thursday, helping to send the benchmark of the Greek stock market higher too.

The small and unconvincing rise registered by the benchmark on Tuesday was followed on Wednesday by fresh losses for the majority of Greek stocks that were contained toward the end of the session. As usual, the decline came with a notable increase in trading volume.

The reaction of investors to the drop in stock prices on the Greek bourse in recent days wasn't strong enough to offer any optimism in the medium term, but it did halt the losing streaks of both the benchmark and the banks indices on Tuesday.