Copenhagen Stock Exchange: Share Trading Volume In March 2002 At Its Highest Since July 2001

The turnover in shares and unit trusts came to just under DKK 2 billion a day in March, which is the highest average daily turnover since the new reporting rules were implemented in July last year. Compared with February 2002, the daily turnover increased by 20 per cent.

The unit trust certificates from the 174 listed funds saw a turnover of DKK 2.7 billion.

The three most traded shares with turnovers of around DKK 4 billion were Group 4 Falck, Vestas Wind Systems and Danske Bank.

The KFX shares accounted for DKK 29 billion of the turnover, corresponding to 80 per cent of the total turnover.

The KFX Index continued its upward trend and closed the month of March at 278.64, which was 2.1 per cent higher than at end-February and 5.4 per cent lower than the end of March the year before.

On 1 March 2002, the Exchange established a new marketplace, the XtraMarked, for non-listed unit trusts. The trading in the 46 funds that are on the XtraMarked amounted to just under DKK 2 billion. The market value reached just over 23 billion at end-March.

Bond trading amounted to DKK 395 billion in market value. The average daily trading volume rose by 23 per cent on February to DKK 20.8 billion and remained unchanged compared with the same month the year before. Government bonds reached a turnover of DKK 131 billion, and the standard mortgage credit bonds a turnover of DKK 214 billion.

The repo-based bond trading grew by 2 per cent compared with February and fell 28 per cent compared with the same month the year before and amounted to DKK 1,059 billion in market value.

The average yield closed the month of March at 5.70 per cent, an increase of 20 basis points compared with end-February.

At the end of March 2002, the bonds in circulation totalled a nominal value of DKK 2,062 against 2,064 billion at the end of February. This was an increase of 4 per cent compared with March 2001. In March, bonds were delisted corresponding to a circulating volume of DKK 34.2 billion, and DKK 0.8 billion was injected through new bond series. The issues amounted to DKK 31.7 billion, primarily in mortgage credit bonds.

Derivatives trading has been around an average 2,000 contracts a day since the beginning of 2002. The KFX Index-futures account for the majority at 27,964 contracts, approx. 72 per cent of the total number of contracts of 38,762 in the month of March. Equity options came to a record high at 9,833 contracts in March, which is an increase of 56 per cent compared with February 2002.