The Athens stock exchange continued its upward series,  with transactions strongly increasing for the second day.

Specifically, the General Index reached 1,462.68 points (+1.03%); however, after slowing down in the last hour, it was finally limited to a subtle rise of 0.06% to 1,448.7 points, which was actually the result of the auctions.

As mentioned above, turnover remained high at 175.5 million euros, of which only 15 million were in parcels (a large 2.1 million in El. Venizelos, another 2.1 million at Optima, and 7 at Ethniki for 4.2 million), with the trading volume at 46 million pieces.

The banking index, which reached 1,282 points (+2%), eventually closed at 1,264.53 with +0.58%; the FTSE was up a modest 0.06% at 3,533.19 points; and the mid-cap FTSEM closed at 2,314.7 points with a loss of 0.57%.

After the market yesterday impetuously broke through the 1,425 resistance zone and hit new 13-year highs, today it showed momentum to extend them significantly further (as it did intraday) but, rather predictably, saw investors in the process consolidate some of the previous five-day's significant gains, especially in blue chips that had outperformed from the start of the upward reaction.

At the same time, however, the banking sector, which had lagged further behind in the bullish three-day period that ended last week, continued to lead buyers today.

The session revolved around 5 stocks, the 4 banks, and Mytileneos, which made a cumulative 120 million euros in turnover out of 175 million for the whole day (107 million on the DTP).

Piraeus topped the turnover with 41.6 million euros but remained unchanged at 4 euros; Eurobank followed with 27.2 million at 2.01 euros with a strong rise of 1.64%; and NBG at 7.56 euros with a 1.93% jump on 20.25 million transactions.

A negative exception was Alpha, which fell to EUR 1.627 with a sharp 2.4% drop, completing 4th place in terms of turnover with 18.2 million.

Mytilineos, after a five-day rally with a gain of almost 10% today, corrected with a 1.3% drop to 38.3 euros and a turnover of 12.8 million.

Beyond that, the market found further support in Motor Oil, which jumped 2.8% to 27.28 euros with a turnover of 4.4 million; Jumbo at 28.38 euros with +1.14%; and 4 million with Cenergy (1.9 million) at 7.57 euros with +1.75%; Sarantis (1.1 million) at 11.88 euros with +1%; and Ellaktor (446 thousand euros) at 2.59 euros with +0.97%.

Apart from Alpha and Mytilineos, sellers focused on Quest (EUR 272k) at -1.93%, Lamda (1.1m) at -1.56%, TERNA Energy (3.4m) at -1.04%, OTE (3.8m) at -0.97% and GEK Terna (2.4m) at -0.96%.

Viochalco (1.4 mn) with -0.6%, Elvalhalkor (354k) with -1.02% and Titanas with small losses below 0.55% were PPC, OPAP, and ELPE.

Elsewhere, Optima resumed its explosive pace with a 3.7% jump to EUR 10.66 on transactions worth EUR 3.8 million, while El. Venizelos, with a high turnover of 2.7 million (due to the large package), rose marginally by 0.12%.

In the mid-cap sector, Epsilon (EUR 445 thousand) rallied 5.1%, while Intralot (EUR 1.3 million) posted a loss of 2.56% and Intrakat (EUR 1.2 million) posted a gain of 2.4%.