BUX falls, but outperforms on Richter
The Budapest Stock Exchangeʼs main BUX index finished down 0.07% at 21,890.82 Wednesday after falling 0.56% Tuesday. It is up 31.60% from year-end, after losing 10.40% last year.
The Budapest bourse resumed rising for most of the day, turning red only in last seconds trade but still outperforming most European peers, mainly on pharma company Richter which became popular as a safe haven while global markets are volatile, and cyclicals, including Magyar Telekom, fall.
In final trades on Tuesday, Richter has already scaled resistance at HUF 4,550, getting green light towards the next resistance point at HUF 5,700, technical analysts say. Investors also start positioning ahead of the results season, hoping for stimulating numbers from the drugmaker, complete with some consolidation of its Ukrainian and Russian businesses.
OTP Bank also corrected a bit up for almost the entire day, cut down only by profit taking in very last trades, after Hungaryʼs economy minister said the government began talks with local banks last week "to remove impediments" to corporate lending and boost credit supply. He did not elaborate, but analysts add "removing impediments" are relatively soothing words compared to earlier statements from both the government and the central bank, suggesting the authorities wanted to make increased corporate lending a clear condition of decreasing the special bank levy gradually from next year, backtracking on a government pledge to EBRD in February to cut the bank levy with no strings attached, and after the first cut has already been adopted by parliament with next yearʼs budget.
Second reading official statistics out on Wednesday showed Hungaryʼs industrial production and sales, both domestic and exports, fell for a second month to a twelve-month low in August in unadjusted terms. Seasonally and workday adjusted production, and domestic and exports sales also fell in August in monthly comparison. Annual production volumes growth accelerated at an equal pace in both unadjusted, and seasonally and workday adjusted terms after a sharp slowdown in July, but remained below the year-to-date average.
OTP lost 0.14% to HUF 5,700 on turnover of HUF 2.83 bln from a preliminary HUF 6.18 bln session total, two-thirds of the daily average this year.
MOL fell 0.38% to HUF 13,145 on turnover of HUF 837m.
Magyar Telekom dropped 1.77% to HUF 389 on turnover of HUF 407m.
Richter advanced 1.05% to HUF 4,638 on turnover of HUF 1.98 bln.
The bourseʼs mid-cap BUMIX went out 0.25% higher at 1,617.86.
Elsewhere in the region, WIG 20 in Warsaw was down 0.07%, while Pragueʼs PX shed 1.00%.
Western Europeʼs major indices were all down ahead of their close on Wednesday, FTSE100 in London 1.02%, DAX30 in Frankfurt 1.08%, and CAC40 in Paris 0.58%.
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