Serbian stock indices mostly higher, turnover more than halves

The blue-chip BELEX15 index of the Belgrade Stock Exchange edged up 0.26% to 448.88 points after falling 0.24% on Thursday.

The broader BELEXline gained a further 0.24% to 886.28 points, following a 0.44% increase in the previous trading session.

The joint SRX index of the bourses in Belgrade and Vienna fell 0.29% in euro terms to 138.67 points. They lost 0.06% a day earlier.

Total turnover plunged to 10.6 million dinars ($120,000/93,000 euro) from 25.8 million dinars on Thursday.

The preference shares of Banka Postanska Stedionica generated Friday's largest turnover of 2.3 million dinars, closing 16% higher at 19,200 dinars. The bank's ordinary shares, however, attracted no investor interest.

Razvojna Banka Vojvodine (RBV) led the gainers, adding 20.11% to 424 dinars in a volume of 112 shares.

“Razvojna Banka Vojvodine jumped 20% after yesterday's announcement by the autonomous province of Vojvodina’s leaders that the bank will be recapitalized with 150 million euro, which is more than double the bank’s equity," Milos Bijanic, financial analyst at Belgrade-based Sinteza Invest Group, commented for SeeNews. He, however, added that bank's stock will most likely continue to raise but probably not to the level that would equal the price-to book ratio before the recap.

RBV said on Thursday it has called an extraordinary shareholders meeting for November 19 to put to vote plans to get recapitalised by the Vojvodina provincial government. According to data from the National Bank of Serbia, the government of the autonomous province of Vojvodina is RBV's biggest shareholder with 62.49%, followed by Serbia's central government with 23.51%.

Engineering company Termomont paced the decliners, losing 17.86% to 460 dinars in a volume of 56 shares.

(1 euro=114.5156 Serbian dinars)