ISE enjoys €17.7bn surge in trade

There has been a €17 billion plus surge in trade in equities and government bonds on the Irish Stock Exchange (ISE) with gross turnover hitting €43.86bn in the first quarter — up 68% from €26.09bn in the final quarter of 2012.

Ireland’s phased return to the markets has fuelled the growth with the NTMA’s issuing 14 new Irish government bonds and three treasury bills in the first quarter of 2013 raising €9.2bn, boosting the ISE listings of Irish government bonds to €101.1bn, an increase of 12.1% from €90.2bn since year end.

The daily trade in Irish government bonds has hit an average of €477m, up from €253m in the final quarter of 2012. In all €29.54bn in Irish government bonds was traded in the first quarter, up 82.7% on the final quarter of 2012 when just €16.17bn in bonds were traded.

Irish Stock Exchange, CEO Deirdre Somers, said: “The strong trading figures on the Irish market in Q1 reflect, primarily, the excellent performance of Irish companies since 2012. Other factors include the improved international sentiment towards Ireland Inc and the ISE’s high quality, easily accessible and low-cost trading platform which enables international investment and reach for Irish companies.”

On the equities front, a record 786,000 trades were completed generating turnover of €14.32bn, up 44.4% on the €9.92bn traded in the final quarter of 2012 and up 38% on the €10.38bn traded in the comparable first quarter of 2012.

“This growth in trading, up 24.2% on the same period last year (Q1 2012: 632,000) and 42.1% on the last quarter, demonstrates the underlying liquidity of the Irish market and strong demand for Irish equity trading on the ISE,” an exchange spokesperson said.

The Iseq overall index made its biggest first-quarter gain since 1998 rising by 16.5%, continuing the momentum it established in 2012 when it was one of the top performing indices in Europe. Figures supplied by the ISE indicate that in the first quarter of 2013, the Iseq outperformed indices such as the S&P 500 (+10%), the Nasdaq (+8.2%) and the FTSE 100 (+8.7%). The Iseq 20 index, which tracks the top 20 Irish shares, saw an increase of 17.2%.

The market capitalisation of Iseq-quoted companies also increased by 21.6% during the first quarter, reaching €105bn at the end of March 2013 (Q4 2012: €86.4bn).

“With improving global investor confidence the ISE saw new debt securities admitted to listing on the ISE up 27% in the first quarter to 858,” the ISE said.