Eurobank Ergasias

Last-minute profit taking during Tuesday's closing auctions at the Athens Exchange (ATHEX) inflicted minor losses on the benchmark after wiping out all of its earlier gains. However, the blue chip and banks indexes remained in positive territory, primarily thanks to Piraeus Bank's gains on the day.

Eurobank, Greece's third-largest lender by assets, said on Friday that its takeover of Grivalia Properties was given the green light by the European Union's competition authority because it meets state aid rules.

In November Eurobank agreed a 780-million-euro deal to buy Grivalia Properties to boost its capital and speed up the reduction of sour loans.

Deputy Prime Minister Yiannis Dragasakis warned on Wednesday in Parliament of the possibility that local banks may require a fresh capital injection that the Greek taxpayers could once again have to cover.

In doing so, he started to prepare citizens for the consequences of the upcoming plans for tackling nonperforming loans.

The proposal by the Bank of Greece to reduce bad loans through the use of deferred tax assets would allow lenders to channel both their provisions and their considerable capital reserves in the right direction, credit sector sources say.

Italian non-performing loan management company Cerved Group said on Thursday it had agreed to buy the property services arm of Greek lender Eurobank for up to 13 million euros ($15 million).

Moody's Investor Service informed its clients that Greek systemic banks are on a good course to meeting their nonperforming exposure reduction targets, with Eurobank and National being closer to making it by 2021, while Alpha has the strongest tangible capital base.

A Fitch Ratings statement, saying that the plans proposed in Athens for the reduction of bad loans in Greece could offer genuine hope for the credit sector's redemption, boosted local bank stocks on Tuesday, which had a positive knock-on effect on the rest of the market too.

The slight recovery of stock prices during the closing auctions on Thursday did not suffice to offset the losses of the Athens benchmark, which ended almost 1 percent lower. Banks were at the focus of selling interest again.

One of the biggest surveying service suppliers and nonperforming loan management companies, Italian group Cerved, is entering the Greek market after obtaining the necessary licenses for managing NPLs from the Bank of Greece and acquiring Eurobank's subsidiary, Eurobank Property Services (EPS).

Investor confidence appears to be returning gradually to local banks, with their stocks outperforming on Tuesday on the Athens bourse and the market's benchmark climbing for a fourth consecutive day - a performance unseen since October. Persistently low turnover shows that it only takes a handful of buyers to sway the market's course.