Stock market: Gains of up to 147% in the first half of 2021

The General Price Index closed with gains of 9.38% in the January-May 2021 half-year, while the total market capitalization increased by €8.613 billion.

January closed with a decline of 7.35%, followed by three months of growth (February +5.73%, March +9.17%, April +5.24%), while a decline was recorded in May (-1.70%) and June (-1.11%).

Perhaps the biggest gain of these first six months of 2021 is that Greek investors are gradually returning to the market, as recorded by the mobility of codes, with active codes exceeding 36,000 in March and May, the best performance since the summer of 2014.

In fact, March 2021 saw the highest number of new codes opened since December 2015, indicating that domestic investors have also begun to look at the stock market again.

The market was buoyed by the growth prospects of the Greek economy, with international investment firms continuously revising their GDP growth targets upwards, at a time when the procedures related to the Recovery Fund are accelerating.

The banking index closed the first half of the year with gains of 7.35%, with encouraging results for the first quarter of 2021 presented by systemic banks, while the reduction in NPEs was also significant.

Of the €112 billion in non-performing loans at the end of 2015, which stood at 50% of total loans, they now stand at €31.4 billion and 26.1%, with the prospect of falling to €7.6 billion at the end of the year and a single-digit NPL ratio.

A positive climate prevailed in the bond market, with the spread between Greek 10-year bonds and the corresponding German bund reaching a new low for the post-2008 era a few weeks ago.

First half-year returns

The biggest gains in the first half of the year were recorded by the shares of Bitros (+147.25%), Lanacam (+125.56%), Leventis (+123.20%), Yalco (+109.15%), Minerva (+102.83%), Domiki Kritis (+97.04%), Ilida (+87.76%), Intracom (+87,11%), Moda Bango (+86,59%), Foodlink (+84,81%), Epsilon Net (+79,49%), Plastika Thrakis (+76,08%), Euroconsultants (+74,24%), Biocarpet (+73,41%), Lenvenderis (+71,57%), Klosteria Nafpaktou (+70,97%), Avax (+67,54%), Reds (+62,59%), Audiovisual (+61,09%) and Mouzakis (+59,57%).

On the contrary, the biggest losses were recorded by the shares of Piraeus (-93.05%), Varvaressos (-38.73%), Kekrops (-37.27%), Attica Bank (-28.21%), Euroxx (-27.00%), Spiro's Agricultural House (-20.56%), ANEK (-20.00%), Progressive (-16.00%), MIG (-13.33%), AEGEK (-12.86%) and Ellaktor (-12.48%).

Among large-cap stocks, Eurobank (+46.91%), Mytilineos (+28.91%), Motor Oil (+21.10%), PPC (+20.73%), EYDAP (+20.38%), Elvalhalcor (+19.41%), Titan (+19.07%), Viohalco (+18.725), GEK TERNA (+18.65%), OPAP (+17.40%), Coca Cola HBC (+1.54%), ELPE (+13.70%), Aegean Airlines (+13.18%), Alpha Bank (+12.97%), OTE (+7.44%), National Bank (+6.15%), Lamda Development (+5.92%), Hellenic Exchanges (+5.26%), PPA (+1.23%) and Jumbo (+0.39%).

In contrast to high capitalization, losses were recorded by the shares of: Piraeus (-93.05%), Ellaktor (-12.46%), Terna Energy (-9.85%), Sarantis (-4.81%), and ADMIE (-1.51%).