Bulgarian Stocks Mostly Rebound in Technical Bounce-back

The SOFIX index, which includes the 20 most liquid stocks on the Bulgarian Stock Exchange (BSE), gained 4.49% to 337.09 points, and the broader BG40 index, which tracks the 40 most traded shares on the bourse, added 0.86% to 97.55.

A day earlier SOFIX sank 10.74% to 322.60 points and BG40 plummeted 10.52% 96.72 closing as panicked investors sold off their holdings.

“The rises are a reaction to yesterday’s sharp drop,” Svetozar Abrashev, a broker with Sofia International Securities, told SeeNews, adding that trading was not driven by fundamentals.

The share indices opened as high as 10% from Tuesday but pared gains later in the session.

Abrashev said that trading volumes, except for several large-scale bloc deals, remained low.

BSE's turnover slightly rose to 28.6 million levs ($18.5 million/14.6 million euro) from 28 million levs from on Tuesday as a bloc transaction in fuel retailer Petrol lifted it again.

Petrol lost 1.09% to close at 9.0 levs in turnover of over 2.472 million shares.

Among the biggest blue-chip advancers on Wednesday were fuel and construction materials trader Toplivo and power tools manufacturer Sparky Eltos, which posted double-digit gains.

Toplivo soared 21.59% to 6.42 levs in volume of 570 shares, while Sparky Eltos surged 10.63% to 2.60 levs with 2,032 shares changing hands.

On Wednesday, advancers led decliners by 58 to 41 and 16 shares closed flat.

The BG-REIT index, tracking the performance of real estate investment trusts, fell 1.39% to 48.14 and the BG TotalReturn30 (BG TR30) index, in which companies with a free float of at least 10% have equal weight, rose 4.69% to 269.06 points.

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, added 3.27% to 53.01 points.

(1 euro = 1.95583 Bulgarian levs)