Nervous investors bailed out of Norma's stock last week, sending the share price down 15 percent until on Friday the stock exchange suspended trading with the company's stock at the issuer's request in expectation of news.
Despite the damage to Norma, the exchange's TALSE index rose by 0.26 percent to 99.4 points over the week.
"Norma has been sold down over this week," Kawe Kapital broker Harry Jurgenson said.
"If you wait for something very long and there is insecurity, there will be more and more of those wanting to get rid of their shares," the broker said.
Insecurity did make investors sell and so the price of Norma stock fell by 5 percent both Wednesday and Thursday and reached 32.30 kroons ($2.22). On Friday, there was no trading with the share at the issuer's request. Deals with Norma stock generated 8.9 million kroons of turnover in the outgoing week.
The week's biggest turnover of 10.7 million kroons was in Hansapank stock. The price of the shares rose by 0.66 percent from last Friday's level and closed at 76 kroons. The lowest it hit during the week was 73.75 kroons. In Jurgenson's opinion, Hansapank holds at 74 kroons and should not significantly fall below that level.
Large deals brought the turnover of Uhispank stock up to 9.4 million kroons. Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken's announcement that it would increase its holding in the bank to more than 50 percent also raised the price of the share by 2.2 percent. The share closed at 23.20 kroons on Friday. The turnover from deals with Compensation Fund bonds was higher than usual, totaling 17.6 million kroons. EVP privatization vouchers accounted for 10 million kroons of the week's total turnover of 64.4 million kroons.
Latvia: Ventspils Nafta pulls up indexes
The sharp rise in trading in Ventspils Nafta's shares and its price boosted the Riga Stock Exchange's indexes. The cap-weighted DJRSE index jumped 6.23 percent last week to 74.12 points and the RICI price index by 5 percent to 158.61 points.
Obviously at a price of just above 0.30 lats ($0.52) the oil terminal's shares were an attractive buy for some investors, and the large orders led to a jump in the company's share price and turnover on the bourse.
But once Ventspils Nafta's share price soared 21 percent to 0.40 lats the trading died down. Since buyers appear unwilling to buy at a higher price, it is unlikely there will be active trading in the company's stock the coming week. This past week trading in Ventspils Nafta's shares nearly hit 400,000 lats and accounted for more than 80 percent of the bourse's total turnover. There was also some relatively active trading in Latvijas Gaze's shares, which rose 1.75 percent to 1.74 lats, as well as in Unibanka's shares, which climbed 2.27 percent to 0.90 lats.
Interest in Latvijas Gaze's shares was connected with the upcoming auction of shares on October 11, where the minimum price had been set at 1.80 lats. Speculators hoped the auction would drag up the share's price on the bourse. The speculation surrounding Unibanka's shares is more interesting. New rules protecting small shareholders will force the bank's main shareholder, Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken, to make an offer to remaining shareholders at a significant premium to the market price or reduce its stake.
If SEB makes the offer at the 1.13 lats required by the regulations then Unibanka's share price is likely to rocket up. But if SEB decides to reduce its stake to under 50 percent then 130,000 shares will hit the market and the bank's share price will likely dive.
The need to make the mandatory offer, and at what is currently a premium of 25 percent over the market price, came as a surprise to SEB, and the Swedish bank is seeking a way out of the situation.
Lithuania: Ukio and Hermis dominate
Trading in Hermis and Ukio banks' shares dominated on the Lithuanian National Stock Exchange last week. The benchmark LITIN-10 index jumped 8.10 percent to 1308.96 points. The blue-chip Litin index posted, however, only a modest 0.64 percent gain, up to 533.05 points. On the official list, trading in Hermis' shares was the most active, with the share price climbing 2.9 percent to 123 litas ($30.75) on a turnover of 511,900 litas. But most of the trading in the bank's shares was in direct deals, with 166.8 million litas in deals.
Baltic Securities broker Dmitry Dutov said the deals were tied to a central bank decision which forced Vilniaus Bankas to buy Bankas Hermis shares from people connected with Vilniaus Bankas.
Trading in Vilniaus Bankas shares picked up in the second half of the week. Turnover on the central market totaled 308,100 litas for the week, with the share price climbing 0.94 percent to 23.70 litas.
Suprema broker Arvydas Jacikevicius said trading in the bank's shares is picking up steam and may continue to do so as Hermis shares disappear from the market, and Vilniaus Bankas' share becomes the preferred one for investment. Ukio Bankas was the leader among current list stocks. Its share price soared 32.75 percent to 12.97 litas on a central market turnover of 1.49 million litas. Direct deals added another 5.5 million litas in turnover.
"It is possible that somebody is putting together a large package of shares in Ukio Bankas, or maybe it's a speculative game," said Finasta broker Aurelijus Rimkus. At the end of the week Ukio Bankas' share price began to drop, sliding 1.22 percent on Friday. It may be due to the cryptic statement by the bank's chairman that the as yet unnamed strategic investor will not take part in the new share issue as it "doesn't view clear perspectives for Lithuania's economic growth."
Mazeikiai Nafta's shares also rose sharply - by 25 percent to 0.85 litas. The central market turnover of the company's shares totaled 150,000 litas.
The jump in interest in the stock was due to the arrival in Lithuania of the head of Williams International, the potential investor in the oil complex, and the renewed hope that the deal will be completed, Suprema's Jacikevicius said.
The bourse's turnover totaled 207.8 million litas, with 3.5 million litas in turnover on the central market.
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