This week, as usually, Profit.bg interviewed capital market participants on their expectations about the sentiments on the Bulgarian Stock Exchange over the next five days. Here is what they had to say:

Krassimir Batsinov, broker, Fico Invest

I expect higher turnover volumes on the Bulgarian Stock Exchange during the week compared to the previous five trading sessions. A higher trading activity is likely in the holding companies, which released their consolidated financial reports for 2007.

The trends on the international capital markets and raw material prices will also attract interest and I think that the indexes may be affected by the bearish, rather than by the bullish sentiments. I believe that the low trading volumes and the small index movements will continue.

Borislav Nikov, board of directors member, Status Invest

There is a slight upward movement in stock prices over the last two weeks. This, however, proved insufficient for the stock indexes to surpass the levels set over the last month.

There are no factors strong enoungh to influence the market so that the trade can move up or under the established levels. This affects the trading activity and we were witnesses to some of the lowest daily tirnovers over the recent months.

This situation is lileky to continue during this week after the good (although not unexpected) consolidated company reports were not enough to bring about a considerable turnover increase. The demand at lower levels (including by insititutional investors) is picking up, which lends some support to stock prices.

It should be taken into consideration that the international situation is rather negative after the worse-than-expected macroeconomic data in the USA, which send the markets lower on Friday and increased the recession fears in the world's largest economy.

Yavor Spassov, broker, MKB Unionbank

I do not see a reason for a sharp change in the sentiments on BSE this week. The stocks of a large number of the traded companies continue to be offered at attractive prices, but the fear of new sales is among the major reasons for the inactiveness of the buyers.

The foreign investors, who were the first ones to react to the events in the USA, are also likely to be the first ones to spark buying, which is only a matter of time.

Daniel Dimitrov, portfolio manager, Real Finance

The number of corporate events will be a lot smaller this week after the deadline for the release of the corporate reports expired last week.

Even the good reports of some of the companies were unable to send their stock prices considerably higher. This strengthens the trend of the recent weeks of the market not reacting to the news.

I expect that the indexes and most of the stocks will not move considerably in either directionduring this week. More considerable movements may be sparked by big slumps or rises on the internaitional markets as in the case of the US markets on Friday and the Asian markets on Monday.

Nevertheless, there is a correlation between the Bulgarian and the foreign capital markets in recent weeks after the withdrawal of many foreign investors from BSE.

The article is not a recommendation for buying or selling stocks!