The Read
Athens LAGGED the global quarter-end melt-up: the General Index eased into the H1 close on bank pressure, but still booked a ~16% first half. Tuesday 30 Jun: the General Index closed -0.31% at 2,459.77 (intraday high 2,479.78) on a defensive, bank-pressured tape that gave back part of Monday's +0.74% banks-led bid — turnover near €294m on record H1 flows, the index still eyeing 2,500. It sealed a strong half: June +3.67%, H1 +~16%, with GEK TERNA (+77.7%), ADMIE (~+57%) and Cenergy (+54.7%) the YTD leaders. Globally it was a different tape — Wall Street MELTED UP into the mark (S&P a record 7,499 +1.2%, Nasdaq +2.4%, a 2nd straight Dow record) on a chip-led bid, sealing the best quarter since 2020 — but US yields ROSE with it (10Y +9bp to 4.46%), a hawkish undertone Greek duration and the GGB (~3.53%) will feel. With the half marked, the political calendar takes centre stage.
Synthesis
Three threads into the H2 open. (i) The secondary tape paused; the PRIMARY market is roaring — a capital-formation cycle. Athens eased ~0.3% on bank pressure at the H1 close, but that consolidation under 2,500 (still +16% on the half, record flows) is the quiet half of the story. The loud half is issuance: GEK TERNA cleared a surprise €659.3m ABB overnight — upsized from €500m, ~6x covered in ~45 minutes at a tight 3.4% discount (€42.50 vs €44.00) — and it is only the latest. In six weeks Greek corporates have raised or launched well over €5.5bn of fresh equity: PPC €4.25bn (a record ~€17bn book, the largest ever for a listed Greek name), ADMIE Holding €530m, ElvalHalcor ~€250m, now GEK TERNA, alongside AKTOR's M&A-led expansion and the Viohalco/Cenergy capex. The message is bigger than any one name: post-investment-grade Greece is funding a domestic capex supercycle — grids, generation, concessions, reshored industry, data centres — in the primary market, at tight terms, taken down by international institutions. That is capital being FORMED, not just re-rated: the investment leg of the growth story, crowding IN real capex and deepening the ATHEX from the inside. The ~15% bank discount to EU peers still holds into the 29-31 Jul results. (ii) The global divergence to watch is rates. Wall Street's record melt-up came WITH a 9bp back-up in the US 10Y to 4.46% — a firmer-rates impulse that, if it extends on Thursday's June jobs print, pressures Greek duration and the rate-sensitive infra leaders (ADMIE, GEK TERNA) more than the banks. Brent's bounce to $73.13 on the Doha stall is the offsetting tail. (iii) Politics takes the wheel. A fresh Alco (FLASH) print — ND 24%, ELAS 14.7%, PASOK 10.4% — the centre-left transfer war, the Samaras voter-pool question, and a coordinating non-ELAS left are the live variables into the September TIF. What changes the picture: a hot June payrolls revives higher-for-longer and pressures the GGB; a confirmed Hormuz re-escalation re-bids crude and inverts the disinflation tailwind that carried the half.