Athens News Agency: News in English, 00-07-27

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From: The Athens News Agency at <http://www.ana.gr/>

CONTENTS

[01] ASE-President-Resignation

[02] Sports - Olympics

[03] Foreign Exchange Rates-Friday

[04] Weather Forecast-Friday

[05] ASE-close

[06] Intracom-Hungarian acquisition

[07] Interamerican-new acquisition

[08] ASE-information companies-listing

[09] Greece-economy-businesses

[01] ASE-President-Resignation

National Economy Minister Yiannos Papantoniou on Thursday accepted the resignation of the President of the Athens Stock Exchange, Spyros Kouniakis.

According to sources, Kouniakis had submitted his resignation, for personal reasons, six months ago.

The same sources said Kouniakis is expected to be replaced by the current president of the Athens Derivates Exchange (ADEX), Papanayiotis Alexakis.

[02] Sports - Olympics

The Athens 2004 Olympics Organising Committee plans to take the 2004 Olympic torch relay through Italy, the Balkans and Cyprus as a symbol of peace, the government announced on Thursday.

The flame, to be lit from the sun's rays in ancient Olympia, would travel through Italy, Albania, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), Bulgaria, Turkey and Cyprus, Culture Minister Theodoros Pangalos told a press conference.

"The Olympic Flame has a very strong symbolism. It can help towards the improvement of our relations with neighbouring countries," Deputy Sports Minister George Floridis told the same conference.

The issue will be discussed with the competent ministers of these countries during a meeting in northern Greece in August, he added.

[03] Foreign Exchange Rates-Friday

Following are indicative rates released by the central bank for the next working day.

Fridays rates (buying)

Euro 334.552

U.S. dollar 355.979

German mark 170.054

[04] Weather Forecast-Friday

Temperatures are expected to drop slightly in much of mainland Greece on Friday, but will remain high at about 40C. Winds will be northerly, light to moderate.

[05] ASE-close

Equity prices staged a technically-driven moderate rebound on Thursday but remained below the 4,000 level on the Athens Stock Exchange.

Dealers said the recovery was anticipated as the market seems to be locked in the 3,900-4,100 level range.

Turnover remained at the previous days' low levels, excluding two huge block trades, worth 290 billion drachmas, in Hellenic Telecoms and Hellenic Petroleum, transferred by Greece's Public Securities Company to foreign investors as part of a convertible bond loan deal.

The general index ended at 3,973.46 points, up 0.58 percent, but off the day's highs of 4,000. Turnover was 355.82 billion drachmas.

The FTSE/ASE 20 index for blue chip and heavy traded stocks ended 0.42 percent higher at 2,221.10 points and the FTSE/ASE 40 index rose 0.28 percent to 557.26 points.

The parallel market index for smaller capitalisation stocks ended 1.59 percent higher at 722.95 points.

[06] Intracom-Hungarian acquisition

Intracom, a listed telecommunications equipment company, on Thursday announced an agreement to purchased a 55 percent majority stake in Fornax, a Hungarian company, for an undisclosed sum. According to the deal, Intrasoft will hold a 10 percent stake in the company.

Fornax was founded in 1989. It is one of the most important companies in Hungary in the telecommunications, information, Internet and electronic applications sectors and has recently expanded its activities in Austria, Germany, the Czech Republic and Croatia.

The move will help Intracom to strengthen its presence in Hungary and the wider central European market.

Fornax is the main supplier of telecommunications equipment to Matav, the Hungarian telecoms organisation. Deutche Telekom has recently acquired a majority stake in Matav. Its turnover is expected to total 2.6 billion drachmas this year.

[07] Interamerican-new acquisition

Euroclinic, the diagnostics, surgery and hospital centre - a member of Interamerican Group of companies - on Thursday announced the acquisition of Athens Paediatric Clinic, the only private-owned paediatric clinic in Greece, in a move aimed to strenthen the group's presence in the health sector.

The acquisition raises Euroclinic's capacity by 100 beds.

The Group's chairman, Dimitris Kontominas, announcing the deal said the group seeked to play a leading role in the health sector, "where needs are huge and the state system cannot respond effectively".

Interamerican recently acquired Athenian Clinic.

[08] ASE-information companies-listing

Representatives of northern Greece's information companies urged the Athens Stock Exchange chairman, Spyros Kouniakis, to enact new objective evaluation indices for companies seeking listing on the market and to grant special listing access for companies based in regional Greece.

SEPBE's board particularly stessed the importance of the creation of a New Stock Exchange market to companies in the information sector in Northern Greece and for those which pursue innovation or develop an export activity in the Balkans or the rest of Europe.

They said that Thessaloniki has developed into a technology products' export centre and urged for the upgrading of Thessaloniki's Exchange Centre role.

[09] Greece-economy-businesses

National Economy and Finance Minister Yiannos Papantoniou on Thursday unveiled the government's strategy for the country's transition into a "new economy".

Presenting his plans during a press conference, Papantoniou said that the basic axes of the new stragegy would be: promoting a new entrepreneurship culture based on flexibility, effective administration, and deregulating domestic markets in goods and services, particularly telecommunications.

He reminded that the government was taking measures to support new businesses with a new tax package, to be implemented in fall, which envisaged reducing tax factors of non-listed companies from 40 percent to 35 percent, a tax exemption of Internet access for private individuals, and incentives for company mergers.

He announced the creation of a "new economy development fund", called "TANEO", aiming to fund investments in new economy sectors, grant scholarships in information, biotechnology education and award innovative programmes in new technology.

TANEO will be obliged to publish an annual report on its activities.

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