The exceptionally good performance recorded by the Vienna Stock Exchange in the two previous years was followed by significant price losses in 2011. This was due to a high weighting of poorly performing bank stocks in the ATX leading index and close economic ties with the CEE countries and Italy. Italy was one of the main problem countries in the debt crisis during the year just ended. International investors paid little attention to the CEE region, even though most of the CEE countries recorded strong growth and were almost unaffected by the debt crisis.
Price movements on the Vienna Stock Exchange were highly volatile during the entire year. The moderate upward trend at the beginning of the year led to a high for the year of 3,000.70 points in the middle of February. In addition to global stock exchange movements, the nuclear reactor accident in Japan also led to a significant correction on the Vienna Stock Exchange. The moderate price trend that followed was replaced by sharp declines in the second half of the 3rd quarter, and again in the middle of the 4th quarter. These losses were due to deterioration in the economic outlook and an intensification of the debt crisis. The low for the year of 1,652.79 points was reached in the second half of November. Although the ATX subsequently rose to a level of 1,891.68 points by the end of the year, it recorded a loss of 34.9% for the year as a whole.
