Financial News

Local investors only needed a single day of profit taking and quickly returned to the business of buying equities during yesterday's trading session at the Malta Stock Exchange. As a result, the MSE index closed 0.4 per cent higher, comfortably above the psychological level of 4,000 points.

Part of the strength in the market was provided by Bank of Valletta which recouped all of Tuesday's losses to close the day at the Lm5.60c level.

FIMBank was the day's biggest gainer, chalking up a 2.8 per cent rise to close, just $0.05c shy of its all time record high, at $1.85c. Supply remains tight not withstanding this year's surge in price.

HSBC Bank Malta remained a drag on the market as sellers outweighed buyers, forcing the price to decline by 3c or a modest 0.4 per cent on 12 trades, for a total of 6,515 shares.

The buying activity in Maltacom shares did not last much longer than the opening 15 minutes of the session but that span of time was enough to see the entire day's volume of 2,610 shares go through, pushing the price 1.8 per cent higher to close at Lm1.59c.

Similarly Middlesea Insurance rallied 4c5 or 1.4 per cent during the first quarter of an hour. The day's activity was for 2,517 shares purchased at the Lm3.30c level.

Elsewhere in the market, Malta International Airport and International Hotel Investments moved in opposite directions by the smallest permissible amount while 1,414 shares in Datatrak Holdings were exchanged without affecting the previous closing level.

Japanese stocks follow Wall Street lower

The sharp reverse on European bourses seen in the previous session was extended yesterday after a second day of losses on Wall Street following further Federal Reserve officials talk of clamping down on inflation. The FTSE Eurofirst 300 fell 1.4 per cent to 1,211.77 with the Xetra Dax in Frankfurt off 1.5 per cent at 4,993.32, the CAC-40 down 1.5 per cent to 4,527.64 and the FTSE 100 down 1.1 per cent to 5,367.5.

This came as no suprise when Bank of England and the European Central Bank held interest rates at 4.5 per cent and two per cent respectively.

Wall Street closed sharply lower for a second straight day on Wednesday amid profit warnings and economic data that raised fresh fears of the curse of stagflation.

Japan's Nikkei 225 share index suffered its biggest one-day fall in six months yesterday, as nervous investors took profits after overnight falls in US stocks. The Nikkei ended down 2.4 per cent to 13,359.91.

The Topix fell 2.7 per cent to 1,371.37. Oil and coal stocks lost 4.2 per cent, depressed by a fall in crude oil futures in New York. Upstream companies suffered the most, with Teikoku Oil, the oil and gas producer, down 5.6 per cent to €1,080.

Electrical machinery, which has lagged the market in general this year because of scepticism about earnings potential, fell 3.4 per cent. Sony, the consumer electronics giant, closed trading 2.8 per cent lower at €3,790. Hitachi down 4.9 per cent to €720.