YEREVAN, February 17. /ARKA/. A total of 200.3 million drams worth transactions with shares were effected in 2011 at NASDAQ OMX Armenia stock exchange, its director Konstantin Saroyan told a news conference today. He said the figure represents a 57% increase from the previous year.

He said there is a significant positive trend in the stock market this year and added that transaction were made with shares of seven issuers.

Earlier he said the volume of transactions had been downward from 2006 to 20010 and only in 2010 the amount reached 124 million drams compared to 90 million drams in 2009. He said the capitalization of the stock market in Armenia grew in 2011 by 2.3% to 53.8 billion drams, a slight increase from the previous year. In early 2011 Arpa-Sevan’s shares were listed at the stock exchange and the shares of Hrazdan TPP are registered at C market and admitted to trading. According to Saroyan, to date only three companies -Artsakh HPP, Arpa-Sevan and Armeconombank are listed and shares of other seven companies are registered.

In January 2008, Nordic exchange operator OMX Group acquired 100% of shares of the Armenian Stock Exchange (Armex) and the Central Depository of Armenia (CDA). After the combination of NASDAQ and OMX in February 2008, Armex and CDA have become fully owned by the NASDAQ OMX Group. On January 27, 2009, “Armenian Stock Exchange” ojsc was officially renamed as “NASDAQ OMX Armenia” ojsc. On June 5, 2009, “NASDAQ OMX Armenia” ojsc became the owner of 100% of the shares of the “Central Depository of Armenia” ojsc. M.M. -0- ($1 – 389.13 drams). -0-