ATHENS — United States Ambassador to Greece Geoffrey Pyatt rang the opening session bell at the Athens Stock Exchange on Tuesday, at the invitation of Athens Exchange Group CEO Socrates Lazaridis.

Pyatt's visit was held on occasion of the upcoming "10th Greek Investment Forum in New York", to be held online on June 8-11. It is organized by the American-Hellenic Chamber of Commerce and Athens Stock Exchange.

"This is a moment of fantastic opportunity for the US-Greece relationship and especially for our trade and investment ties," noted Pyatt.

"The embassy and I will do all that we can in partnership with the Greek government and the Greek private sector to facilitate trade and investment opportunities between the US and Greece and drive our relationship to even higher levels," he pointed out.

Lazaridis thanked Pyatt for his long-standing support to the Athens Stock Exchange and his encouragement of fresh and innovative Greek entrepreneurship. He also mentioned Pyatt's support for the "Roots" program, which aims to accelerate the growth of innovative Greek SMEs and start-ups, in cooperation with the American-Hellenic Chamber of Commerce and the support of the Global Federation of Competitiveness Councils (GFCC).

Equity prices were rising at the Athens Stock Exchange (ASE) on Wednesday. The basic share price was up 0.83 percent at 875.30 at 11:00 and turnover was at 8.21 million euros.

The FTSE/ASE Large Cap index for blue chip and heavily traded stocks was up 0.95 percent and the FTSE/ASE Mid Cap index was up 0.10 percent.

Individual sector indices were moving mostly upwards, with the biggest gains in Travel & Leisure (+1.45 percent), in Telecoms (+1.44 percent) and in Banks (+1.30 percent). The heaviest losses were in Financials (-1.21 percent) and in Technology (-0.19 percent).