CSE climbs to another record close

Equity prices on the Cyprus Stock Exchange climbed higher, bolstered by a strong rally on banking shares, with the shares of Bank of Cyprus and Laiki Bank pulling the GENX to levels not seen in five years.

The CSE GENX closed 3.89% higher on Monday at a fresh record high of 2303.85, bringing its weekly gains to 6% while since the start of the year, the index is up a whopping 35%.

Total volume amounted to CYP 5.84 mln with 65 titles closing higher, 29 lower, 25 unchanged while no trades were effected on 41 titles. The Main market index was 3.95% higher at 2341.69.

Bank of Cyprus was the most active and at the same instrumental in pulling the CSE higher. BOC shares closed 4.4% higher on the CSE at a fresh record closing high of CYP 3.54 on CYP 2.28 mln volume.

In Greece, the BOC shares closed 1.97% higher at a fresh record close of EUR 6.22 or CYP 3.57 on 1.29 mln shares volume for a value of EUR 8.08 mln or CYP 4.6 mln.

The performance of BOC in Greece was double better the overall ASE performance, where the ASE General Index was 0.82% higher at 4150.19 while the ASE/FTSE 20 was up 0.92% at 2270.45. The ASE/FTSE 40, which from April will also include the BOC shares was up 0.56% at 4205.63 points.

Back on the CSE, the shares of Laiki Bank powered 3.46% to a record close of CYP 2.69 on CYP 1.47 mln volume ahead of the announcement of preliminary results on Wednesday, where according to market expectations, the profits will increase to CYP 43.5 mln from CYP 21.1 mln in 2004.

Hellenic Bank tracked its peers, closing 3.6% higher at a new fresh record close of 0.86 on CYP 533.000 volume. Louis Public Co. (LUI) also hit a new record close of 0.254 for a daily gain of 4.1% while SFS Group Public Co. was up at 9.6 cent.