Budapest Stock Exchange

Plant protection products company Chemark, organic pasta and oil producer Agri-Corn, and Első Pesti Malom ("First Hungarian Mill") have started the joint international training program ELITE of the London Stock Exchange Group and the Budapest Stock Exchange. Thus, the number of the Hungarian medium-sized companies participating in the training providing corporate finance, management and networking opportunities expanded to 13. BSE aims to facilitate domestic medium-sized enterprises'  development.

The Budapest Stock Exchange (BSE) has signed a support agreement with the Ministry for National Economy (NGM) with a view to increasing the efficiency of the Hungarian SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) sector. Hungarian SMEs can apply for non-refundable grants from the BSE. They can use these funds to obtain the necessary know-how for capital market financing, and to cover the costs of going public. The appearance of the new grants represents a milestone within the context of the BSE’s aspirations to offer new services which make public listing more accessible to dynamically developing medium-sized businesses. With this measure, the Government is making an important contribution to the development of the domestic capital market.

The BÉT Legek (Best of BSE 2017) Awards Gala is one of the key events for the Hungarian capital market, which this year recognised outstanding performances on the stock exchange in 2017 in 13 categories, based on market performance and the decision of a professional panel. This year also saw the BSE introduce three new categories, give out a lifetime achievement award, and also give the public the opportunity to weigh in and vote for the “Domestic Stock Trading Platform of the Year” through the BSE website.

Last year saw the Budapest Stock Exchange continue the implementation of its strategy for 2016-2020: a new market focusing on SMEs, Xtend, commenced operations; the BSE’s analytical/market-making programme was successfully rolled out; ten Hungarian companies joined the ELITE company development programme launched in cooperation with the London Stock Exchange; and the Hungarian Exchange set up the Budapest Institute of Banking, its new educational subsidiary. The massive rise of the BUX remained unbroken for the third consecutive year, and cash equity market turnover (perhaps the most important indicator of exchange performance) also increased at an outstanding rate over the past year. UBM became a publicly traded company, and Masterplast and OPUS stocks became premium-category securities. With the listing of Waberer’s, the Hungarian capital market celebrated its largest IPO of the past 20 years. In 2017, the BSE also introduced three new mortgage bond indexes that are unique even by regional standards. Nonetheless, 2017 for the BSE was primarily about introductions to and negotiations – as well as establishing relations – with medium-size companies potentially ready to be admitted to the exchange.

The domestic mortgage bond market has been reinvigorating, the volume of issuances is on the rise, and these favourable tendencies may continue over the next years. In reaction to this reinvigoration, the BSE, in cooperation with the MNB introduces three new mortgage bond indices in December 2017, which will be unique regionally, as well. This can significantly contribute to the development of the mortgage bond market and via increasing transparency support the spread of household mortgage loans with longer interest rate fixation periods.

Budapest Stock Exchange welcomes Interactive Brokers as its newest member in its equities section. Interactive Brokers provided access to the Hungarian market to its 430,000+ customers as part of its expansion in the Central and Eastern European region. Parallelly with the Budapest market clients of the brokerage firm can trade in Warsaw too.

On 11 May 2017, the Budapest Stock Exchange held its annual general meeting. The members of the Board of Directors and the Supervisory Board were elected. The owners also accepted the report for the 2016 business year, as well as the Supervisory Board and the auditor reports. According to the annual report, BSE’s EBITDA for 2016 was HUF 383 million, while its profit after tax amounted to HUF 73 million. A resolution was passed on dividend payment and the remuneration of officers. The management of BSE also presented the results to date of the 2016-2020 five-year strategy and the most important projects for 2017.

Leaders of seven Hungarian companies were on hand to ring the opening bell Tuesday at the London Stock Exchange, marking their participation in the joint business development programme of the Budapest Stock Exchange and ELITE, a company of the London Stock Exchange Group. In line with BSE strategy, the ELITE programme aims to provide world-class training to Hungarian companies to enable them to later successfully conduct capital raising activities.

The Hungarian capital became for two days the centre of the capital markets as Budapest Stock Exchanged hosted the annual World Exchange Congress on 29th - 30 th March. The World Exchange Congress is a one-of-a-kind occasion, bringing together top representatives of various exchanges (large major players together with smaller frontier markets’ representatives, the traditional exchanges, as well as the innovators and the disruptors), clearing houses, supranational institutions, industry experts and consultants as well as a plethora of technology companies, continuously innovating and reshaping the global financial ecosystem. It was a very vibrant environment for sharing ideas and learning from each other’s experience about the latest trends and a great chance to make steps towards new collaborations and partnerships.

On Friday night, the Budapest Stock Exchange (BSE) honoured the Best of 2016 in the Hungarian capital market. The “BÉT Legek Díj” (Best of BSE Awards) was presented in ten categories on the basis of market performance and the decisions of a professional panel. Among others, the “Investment Service Provider of the Year” and the “The Best Investment Story of 2016 in the Stock Market” were selected, and the banks and investment service providers with the highest stock exchange turnover were also recognized.