Stock market
Grupa LOTOS on the Stock Market
The year 2010 began on a bearish note on the Warsaw Stock Exchange. In February, the main indices rallied, however it was not until the second half of the year that the upward trend settled in. Over the whole year, the WIG and WIG20 indices advanced 16.5% and 12.3%, respectively, while the index comprising fuel companies – WIG FUELS – posted gains of 21.9%.
At the beginning of the year, the LOTOS stock clearly underperformed the market, bottoming out at its annual low of PLN 25.05 on the February 25th session. Thereafter, the stock started to follow the market, but only the release of the Company’s new strategy in November provided a sufficient impulse to propel its dynamics past the 100% mark compared with the year’s beginning, translating into positive returns, only slightly below the WIG20 performance. On December 17th, the Company’s stock price reached its annual peak of PLN 37.85 per share. As at the end of 2010, its dynamics, relative to the period’s beginning, was 110.3%, which meant a rise of 10% and PLN 3.40 in absolute terms. On December 31st 2010, the stock closed at PLN 36.35. The average daily volume of trading in 2010 was 234.5 thousand shares. The Company’s market capitalisation as at the year’s end was a little more than PLN 4.7bn.
Generally speaking, the performance of the LOTOS stock was, save for a temporary plunge in the first quarter, fairly stable. It would indicate that investors responded positively to the anti-crisis measures adopted by the Company in 2009 and its consistent implementation of the 10+ Programme.
The relative stability was reflected in investment recommendations regarding the Company’s securities issued throughout 2010 by financial institutions. Positive recommendations slightly outnumbered negative ones: 13 (including four to “buy” and nine to “hold”) to 12 (including six to “sell” and six to “reduce”).
