Cyprus Business Now

Regulatory reporting firm Point Nine has announced a partnership with US company FIS, looking to bolster its ability to provide trade and transaction reporting services to legal entities in overseas regions.

According to company data, Point Nine has processed and reported over seven billion transactions across all asset classes, with a record of 99.95 per cent in terms of submission success within the European Union and the United Kingdom.

“We are thrilled to be selected by FIS to power Trade and Transaction Reporting together,” Point Nine CEO Andreas Roussos said.

“We are proud to engage in this partnership with an S&P 500 firm and we are looking forward to strengthening and developing this partnership further towards achieving common goals,” Roussos added.

The Point Nine CEO explained that the issue lies in the data that firms need to ensure timeline and accurate reporting being stored on multiple systems, segregated from one another.

“By leveraging FIS’ vast amounts of trade data and Point Nine’s capabilities we are thrilled to present FIS Trade Reporting Manager with Point Nine: aiming to ensure timelines and accuracy in reporting whilst reducing costs and associated risks,” Rousos concluded.

The economic sentiment in Cyprus deteriorated in November as the Economic Sentiment Indicator (ESI-CypERC) decreased by 1 point compared with October 2021, the Economics Research Centre of the University of Cyprus said in a report.

The ESI drop has been attributed to the deterioration of construction and services confidence.

“The marginal decrease in the Services Confidence Indicator resulted from downward revisions in demand expectations, despite improved assessments of past performance (business situation and demand),” the centre said.

“The Retail Trade Confidence Indicator remained unchanged as its components (assessments of past sales, views on current stock levels, sales expectations) stayed broadly stable in November,” the centre added.

According to data released by the Central Bank of Cyprus (CBC), non-performing exposures (NPEs) in the Cyprus banking system remained relatively steady in August 2021, while loans in arrears over 90 days rose for the third consecutive month.

NPEs in August came up to €4.96 billion, slightly up from the previous month’s figure of €4.99 billion. This reflects 17.4 per cent of total loans, which totalled €28.46 billion in August.

Meanwhile, loans in arrears over 90 days, which do not include restructured facilities, rose to €3.86 billion, marking a slight increase for the third month in a row.

Of the total NPEs, €2.66 billion are held by households, while €2.07 billion are held by corporations, of which €1.17 billion are owned by small-to-medium sized enterprises (SMEs).

Based on a report released by the Cyprus Statistical Service (Cystat), sales of petroleum products rose by 25.2 per cent year-on-year in October, with the figure coming up to 132,329 tonnes.

The service added that the total amount of fuel sales between January and October of 2021 rose 3.4 per cent year-on-year.

In terms of a detailed breakdown, aviation kerosene rose by 141.6 per cent year-on-year, marine fuel by 21 per cent, kerosene by 130.8 per cent, light fuel oil by 53.8 per cent, heating fuel by 39.7 per cent, liquefied petroleum gases by 15.3, heavy fuel oil by 12.1 per cent, and asphalt by 10.1 per cent.

A slight drop was observed in the sales of road diesel (-2.7 per cent) and motor gasoline (-0.4 per cent).

Finally, fuel stocks at the end of October 2021 rose by 6.8 per cent month-on-month, Cystat concluded.

The Cyprus Stock Exchange (CSE) ended Monday, November 29 with minor profits.

The main Cyprus Stock Market Index was at 66.60 points at 13:14 during the day, reflecting a rise of 0.74 per cent over the previous day of trading.

The FTSE / CySE 20 Index was at 39.83 points, representing an increase of 0.73 per cent.

The total value of transactions came up to €227,586, a noticeably high figure in relative terms.

In terms of sub-indexes, the alternative index fell by 0.43 per cent, while the main and investment firm indexes rose by 1.43 per cent and 2.92 per cent respectively. The hotel index remained stable.

The biggest investment interest was attracted by Vassiliko Cement Works (-0.76 per cent), Pandora (-2.16 per cent), Cyprus Cement Company (-1.96 per cent) and Bank of Cyprus Holdings (+1.44 per cent).