February 1 (SeeNews) - The Bulgarian Stock Exchange blue-chip index ended the first trading session of this month 0.30% lower at 583.98 points, dragged down by a 4.58% plunge in the share price of First Investment Bank (Fibank) [BUL:5F4].
The SOFIX dropped 1.46% overall in January, but ended the month's last trading session with a strong 1.82% rise prompted by Fibank's 9.12% share price gain on January 31.
There were only two other blue-chip losers on Friday - drug maker Sopharma [BUL:3JR] and Bulgarian Real Estate Fund REIT [BUL:5BU], which ended 0.57% and 0.53% lower, respectively.
The BGREIT, which tracks real estate investment trusts, lost 0.10% to 120.65 points solely due to the decline in Bulgarian Real Estate Fund REIT's share price.
The BGREIT ended 2018 at an all-time high of 121.07 points.
The wider BGBX40 index and the equally-weighted BGTR30 index also ended lower on Friday, as Industrial Capital Holding [BUL:4I8] fell most among their members, followed by Fibank.
Total trading turnover shrank to 180,000 levs ($106,000/92,000 euro) on Friday from 1.4 million levs on Thursday.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)