The SOFIX index, which includes the 20 most liquid stocks on the Bulgarian Stock Exchange (BSE), fell 0.89% to 467.83 points, while the broader BG 40 index, which tracks the 40 most traded shares on the bourse, gained 1.57% to 142.77.
“Continuous fall of Holding Roads in high turnovers weighed down on SOFIX,” Konstantin Abrashev, portfolio manager at BenchMark Asset Management, told SeeNews.
Holding Roads started trading new shares from its 70-for-1 bonus issue on Tuesday. Its stocks have been mostly losing ground this week.
It closed 6.25% lower at 4.04 levs on Friday in volume of over 18,000 shares.
On the wining side was grain and oilseed trader Zarneni Hrani, which gained 5.29% to 5.29 levs with 12,000 shares changing hands.
“I attribute the rise to the opening of its biodiesel plant,” Abrashev said. Zarneni Hrani hopes to capture a 66% share of the domestic biodiesel market thanks to the plant.
Lately the Bulgarian capital market has been passively tracking the developments abroad and that’s normal because most of the companies are export-orientated, Abrashev said. He added that the slowdown of the European economy will inevitably affect the performance of Bulgarian companies.
BSE's turnover, excluding block and other pre-agreed deals, rose to 3.6 million levs from 1.45 million levs on Thursday.
On Friday, decliners led advancers by 52 to 35 and four shares ended flat.
The BG TotalReturn30 (BG TR30) index, in which companies with a free float of at least 10% have equal weight, closed unchanged at 354.72 points and the BG-REIT index, tracking the performance of real estate investment trusts, fell 0.17% to 53.45.
The Dnevnik 20 index, calculated by local business daily Dnevnik from the share prices of the 20 leading companies in terms of liquidity and market capitalisation, sagged 2.24% to finish at 68.43 points.
(1 euro = 1.95583 Bulgarian levs)
