The Budapest Stock Exchange’s blue-chip index closed Thursday trade down 0.45% to 21,322.50 as gloomy forecasts and disappointing results from major European companies such as BASF and Siemens as well a the continued stalemate in the US Congress regarding the increase of the country’s debt ceiling needed to avoid looming default dropped the index to its fifth-consecutive decline.
The BUX lost 96.21 points on a light composite exchange turnover of HUF 7 billion, fluctuating in a 1.22% range between an intra-session high of 21,466.40 shortly at 10:10 a.m. and an intra-session low of 21,203.85 shortly after 12:30 p.m.
BSE blue-chips stood as follows at Thursday’s closing bell:
Oil and gas company MOL lost 1.77% to HUF 19,750 on a turnover of HUF 2.23 billion;
Drug company Richter declined 0.27% to HUF 36,300 on a turnover of HUF 216 million;
OTP Bank gained 0.55% to HUF 5,450 on an exchange-high turnover of HUF 3.92 billion;
Magyar Telekom advanced 0.19% to HUF 537 on a turnover of HUF 339 million.
The BSE Big Four generated 95.8% of the exchange’s composite Thursday turnover.
Other major central and eastern European blue-chip stock indices finished mixed on Thursday, with Prague’s PX-50 losing 0.36% and Warsaw’s WIG-20 gaining 0.88%.
