Eurobank Ergasias

The week started at Athinon Avenue with an interesting session that started with gains, then swung to significant losses that were contained by the closing. Banks led the decline at the bourse, but several other stocks resisted, keeping the main index above the 1,400-point level in the end.

The tremors on bourses at the heart of the eurozone reached the bloc's outskirts too on Friday, with stocks at Athinon Avenue losing significant ground and the benchmark taking a nosedive to a two-month low, on a day of increased turnover due to the extensive sell-off. If the upcoming parliamentary election in France generates more uncertainty there, the effects will also be felt in Greece.

Thursday offered investors another bank-centered decline for stocks, which came with a drop in turnover too. The benchmark at Athinon Avenue took significant losses and even closed at the day's low, pointing to a trend for a further drop on Friday morning at least. Observers say the market is waiting for the sale of blue chip Terna Energy to unleash some liquidity.

Despite the rather strong start to Wednesday's bourse session, stocks had to settle for small gains by closing, since the buyers appeared to run out of steam as the day went by at Athinon Avenue.

Eurobank acquired 503,934 more shares in Hellenic Bank on Monday, at a cost of 1.29 million euros, increasing its stake to 55.42% of the total issued share capital and of the voting rights in the Cypriot bank.

Non-bank blue chips helped the Greek bourse contain its decline on Tuesday, as it fared better than other stock markets in the eurozone. The political worries generated in the European Union after Sunday's European Parliament elections continue unabated in certain countries, unlike in Greece.

Stocks at Athinon Avenue offset the early post-election losses on Monday to keep the benchmark in the black by the closing, even though the majority closed in the red. Banks - led by Eurobank - had a positive day and contributed significantly to the recovery of the main and blue chip indexes, though turnover left a lot to be desired.

Banks and a few other blue chips secured sufficient gains on Friday to give the benchmark and the large-cap index a positive closure to the week, while mid-caps and the majority of stocks ended up in the red on the day. Traders appeared to press pause ahead of possible corporate shakeups among the FTSE-25 stocks, with turnover posting a decline.

The decision by the Single Supervisory Mechanism (SSM) of the European Central Bank approving the distribution of dividends by Greek banks helped the credit sector outperform at Athinon Avenue on Thursday and carry along the benchmark to a second day of healthy gains. Nevertheless, the majority of stocks and the mid-cap index ended up in the red.

Greek stocks recovered most of their losses from Tuesday's session on Wednesday, in a rebound that was more common when Athinon Avenue was not perceived as a developed market, but rather a bourse easily swayed by fears and hopes within Greece and abroad, i.e. during the decade-long financial crisis.