Greek Merchant Marine Minister George Voulgarakis and the president of the Athens Stock Exchange Spyros Kapralos on Monday invited shipowners to list their ocean-shipping businesses in the Athens bourse.

The Greek minister, addressing a working lunch, stressed that the listing of healthy ocean shipping enterprises in the Athens Stock Exchange would offer an internationalized boost to the Greek capital market and noted that the government believed it was to the benefit of the shipping community, the national economy and banks to list healthy ocean shipping companies in the Athens bourse and not in foreign markets.

He cited five reasons for listing in the Athens Stock Exchange:
-modern Greek shipping companies have little in common with shipping firms of the past,
-higher security levels in the shipping industry, -higher investor confidence towards shipping companies,
-Greek shipping accounts for 17 pct of the world fleet, 20 pct of the bulk ship fleet and 23 pct of tanker fleet worldwide and,
-efforts made by both the stock market and the Merchant Marine ministry to create the necessary conditions, procedures and preconditions to attract ocean-shipping companies in the market.

The Greek minister added that the first messages of this procedure were positive and expressed his optimism that Greek-interest shipping companies based in London, UK, would relocate to Greece.

The president of the Athens Stock Exchange, Spyros Kapralos, said the Greek market was ready to welcome Greek shipping companies. “It is an exceptional time, a period when all market factors agreed we must attract ocean-shipping companies in the Greek capital market,” Kapralos said, adding that shipping companies could enjoy the same favourable tax status even after their listing in the Athens bourse.

Kapralos said foreign investors showed increased confidence in the Greek capital market, holding more than 50 pct of the market’s capitalization and accounting for more than 65 pct of daily transactions. Net capital inflow in the Greek market exceeded 15 billion euros in the last three years, he said.

Source: Athens News Agency

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