Athens News Agency: News in English, 00-11-27

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

CONTENTS

[01] President-Museum-Inauguration

[02] Sports roundup

[03] Heracles Cement-results

[04] EU-Greece-trade balance

[05] Interamerican Group-results

[06] Minoan Lines-new ship

[07] Alfa Alfa Holdings-results

[08] ASE-close

[09] Viohalco-Fulgor-takeover

[01] President-Museum-Inauguration

President Kostis Stephanopoulos on Monday inaugurated the Centre of Modern Greek and European Art-Museum Frisyra in the picturesque central Athens district of Plaka.

The owner of the museum, Mr. Frisyras, hailed the presence of the president, saying that his presence "honours culture, art and painting."

The museum is exhibiting 3,000 paintings from Greek and European artists. The paintings cover an 80-year period of the 20th Century.

[02] Sports roundup

AEK Athens defeated PAS Yiannena 4-2 on Monday to remain in third place in the Greek first division. The game was much closer than what the final score showed.

At halftime, Olympiakos Piraeus was ahead of PAOK Thessaloniki amid a turbulent 45 minutes and after a series of controversial referring calls against the home club, PAOK.

[03] Heracles Cement-results

Heracles Cement Group on Monday reported an 11 percent rise in its third quarter sales to 132 billion drachmas and a 16 percent increase in sale costs due to higher oil prices and a surging US dollar.

Group net earnings fell 22 percent, to a loss of 6.8 billion, reflecting a high cost of a voluntary retirement programme that ended in September.

Group pre-tax profits fell by 30 percent in the third quarter of the year.

[04] EU-Greece-trade balance

Greece's trade deficit rose by 1.5 billion euros (around 510 billion drachmas) to 12.3 billion euros (4.18 trillion drachmas) in the first eight months of 2000 compared with the same period last year, Eurostat, the EU's statistics agency, said on Monday.

The country's trade deficit was 10.8 billion euros, or 3.67 trillion drachmas, last year.

Greek figures are the third largest deficit among EU member-states, lagging behind UK (42 billion euros) and Spain (25.2 billion euros), in first and second place, respectively.

Germany reported the largest trade surplus with 36.9 billion euros, followed by Ireland with a surplus of 18 billion euros.

Greek exports rose 22 percent in the first eight months of 2000, to 7.8 billion euros, from 6.3 billion last year, while imports rose by 17 percent to 20.1 billion euros from 17.1 billion in 1999.

[05] Interamerican Group-results

Interamerican Group on Monday reported a 22.4 percent rise in its nine-month consolidated profits to 27.9 billion drachmas, from 22.8 billion the same period last year.

Interamerican Life, the group's listed company, reported profits of 17.2 billion drachmas, up 49.6 percent.

A company statement said nine-month revenues totalled 155 billion drachmas, maintaining its lead in premium production among Greece's insurance companies.

Premium production totalled 66.8 billion drachmas for life insurance contracts (up 0.8 percent), 20.5 billion for general insurance (up 22.2 percent), 3.7 billion for health insurance (up 44.5 percent) and 2.2 billion drachmas for road assistance (up 18.4 percent).

Its mutual funds' managing subsidiary, Intertrust, profits totalled 20.6 billion drachmas in the January-September period, up from 16.4 billion in the January-June period despite a protracted correction of prices in the stock exchange.

Interamerican Group said its joint venture with Portugal's BCP, Novabank, was performing very satisfactorily during the two first months of operation, and that the two partners were seeking to expand their activities in the wider Balkan and eastern Mediterranean region.

[06] Minoan Lines-new ship

Minoan Lines on Monday officially welcomed its new fast ferry "Knossos Palace" to its fleet, scheduled to servicing the Piraeus-Heraclion sea line in six hours.

The "Knossos Palace" arrival at the Heraclion harbour on Monday was marked by an official welcome from local authorities and company officials.

Minoan Lines expects the Merchant Marine Ministry to approve the vessel's scheduled operation.

Knossos Palace has a length of 210 metres with a capacity of 2,200 passengers, 150 trucks and 100 vehicles, or 600 vehicles. It can sail at 31.6 knots per hour, making easily the fastest ship in its category in the country's passenger shipping sector.

The vessel offers a fully equipped conference centre, a shopping mall, multi-restaurants, a 60-seat cinema, two swimming pools, a disco and a helicopter platform.

Knossos Palace is the first of four similar vessels built in Fincantieri shipyards in Italy for Minoan Lines. The company has ordered another four ships to Samsung shipyards in South Korea.

Delivery of all eight ships is expected to be completed by spring 2003.

[07] Alfa Alfa Holdings-results

Alfa Alfa Holdings on Monday reported a spectacular 282 percent jump in its nine-month turnover to 68.4 billion drachmas, from 17.9 billion the same period last year.

Profits also jumped to 13.6 billion drachmas, from 4.6 billion in the January-September period in 1999, an increase of 195 percent.

A company statement attributed the improved results to a significant improvement of its subsidiaries' performance in the construction and manufacturing sectors and to the incorporation of Alfa Smart Parks' results.

Alfa Alfa Holdings expects its turnover to reach 170 billion drachmas this year, with profits at 18 billion drachmas.

[08] ASE-close

Equity prices ended lower on Monday, although off their day's lows, in extremely thin trading conditions on the Athens Stock Exchange.

Traders said banks' shares offered support to the wider market, with smaller capitalisation stocks suffering heavy losses and 60 stock shares falling to their lowest levels this year.

The general index ended 0.28 percent lower at 3,312.08 points, with turnover a low 49.15 billion drachmas, of which 19 billion accounted for block transactions in Astir Hotels and Piraeus Leasing.

The FTSE/ASE 20 index for blue chip and heavy traded stocks ended 0.20 percent off at 1,892.81 points, and the FTSE/ASE 40 index ended at 398.62 points, down 0.96 percent.

The parallel market index for smaller capitalisation stocks ended 2.05 percent lower at 346.69 points.

[09] Viohalco-Fulgor-takeover

Viohalco SA on Monday officially denied press reports, according to which it was in talks for the takeover of Fulgor SA.

Viohalco's denial was included in an written answer to the board of the Athens Stock Exchange, sent on Monday.

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