Markets, Business & Tech Briefing: The PSI Closes Within Ten Points of Its 52-Week High, Portugal Pays Over 3 Percent for One-Year Money, KKR Takes the Inside Line on Logoplaste

Yesterday Lisbon rose because oil rose. Today Lisbon rose because oil fell. Both statements are true, and the reason they are not contradictory is that the PSI is not the one-way bet on crude that its Galp weighting suggests. Wednesday's session was the mirror image of Tuesday's: Brent gave back 2.89 percent, the inflation fear that has been driving bond yields up all month eased with it, and every major European index closed higher. Lisbon closed highest of all, and finished ten points short of its 52-week high.

The PSI Closed Ten Points Below Its 52-Week High, and Beat Every Major European Index Again

The PSI finished at 9,540.66 points, up 94.03 points or 1.00 percent from Tuesday's close of 9,446.63. The index opened at 9,452.09, dipped to 9,432.95 at 09:42, and then climbed for the rest of the day to a high of 9,543.04 at 15:57, holding almost all of it into the 16:35 close. Eleven of the sixteen constituents rose, one was unchanged and four fell.

The number that matters most is the one Euronext prints at the bottom of the quote page. The top of the published 52-week range is 9,550.72. The close is 9,540.66. That is a gap of 10.06 points, or 0.11 percent. On Monday the index had fallen 1.52 percent and the range high was 1.09 percent away; two sessions later it is within a rounding error. The comparison is a close against a range high, so it is not exactly like for like, but it is the measure Euronext publishes and it puts the index closer to the top of its year than at any point in the past week.

Around Lisbon the tape was uniformly green, which is the other half of the story. The Stoxx 600 rose 0.51 percent, France's CAC 40 and Germany's DAX 40 both gained 0.62 percent, Spain's IBEX 35 added 0.41 percent and Britain's FTSE 100 rose 0.28 percent. The PSI's 1.00 percent beat all of them. That is the second day running Lisbon has outperformed the continent, and it has now done so on a day crude went up and on a day crude went down.

Closing prices and session moves are Euronext's own, taken from the Lisbon equities list and stamped between 16:35 and 16:38 WEST. Jornal de Negócios and ECO independently report the same index close and the same eleven up, one flat, four down split, so three sources agree on the tape.

The shape of the gainers is worth a second look. The top four are a retailer and three utilities: Sonae, then NOS, then the EDP group, whose two listed arms rose 2.15 and 1.95 percent between them. These are the names that suffer when bond yields climb, because a regulated network or a long-dated renewables portfolio is valued off a discount rate. Yields fell on Wednesday, and they were the first to be bought. Galp, which led the index on Tuesday when crude was rising, was the only heavyweight to fall.

Oil Gave Back Two Sessions of Gains, Which Is Why Lisbon Rose and Galp Did Not

Brent fell 2.89 percent to 105.61 dollars a barrel and West Texas Intermediate fell 3.07 percent to 102.58, on TradingEconomics contract-for-difference pricing stamped 16 September. Both numbers are below where they sat on Tuesday, when Brent was 108.25 and WTI 105.39.

The retreat does not undo the move. Brent is still up 16.22 percent over the past month and 55.42 percent over the past year; WTI is up 21.39 percent on the month and 61.03 percent on the year. What changed on Wednesday was the direction of the last tick, and the direction of the last tick is what sets the inflation expectation that has been driving the bond market. European natural gas was quiet alongside it, at 2.90 dollars per million British thermal units, down 0.55 percent.

Galp closed down 0.41 percent at 21.88 euros, the only one of the index heavyweights in the red. On Tuesday it rose 1.95 percent while the rest of Europe fell. The stock is trading as a crude proxy in both directions, and the 33 percent levy on excess refining and extraction profits that reached parliament on Tuesday has so far had no visible effect on it either way.

Portugal Paid 3.103 Percent for One-Year Money, the Most in More Than Two Years

Yesterday's briefing said the demand figure at Wednesday's Treasury bill auction would say more than the yield. Both came in, and both are worth reading.

The IGCP (Agência de Gestão da Tesouraria e da Dívida Pública, the state treasury and debt agency) confirms on its own results page that it issued 1,000 million euros of the twelve-month bill maturing 17 September 2027, in a single auction held at 10:30 Lisbon time. That is the bottom of the indicative range the agency announced on 11 September, which ran from 1,000 to 1,250 million euros. The IGCP took the minimum it had signalled and left the extra 250 million on the table.

The price is the news. Investors demanded 3.103 percent, the highest rate Portugal has paid on twelve-month paper in more than two years. ECO reports that you have to go back to May 2024 to find a higher one, when the agency raised 750 million euros at 3.451 percent. Demand reached 2,200 million euros, more than double what was placed.

The two outlets that covered the auction do not agree on what the last comparable sale looked like, so both versions are printed here rather than reconciled. ECO says the previous comparable auction was two months ago at 2.682 percent. Jornal de Negócios says the last twelve-month sale was in May, when the IGCP placed 1,537 million euros at 2.613 percent. Either way the move is roughly 45 to 50 basis points in a matter of months, and neither account disputes the 3.103 percent itself.

Filipe Silva, director of investments at Banco Carregosa, told ECO that the rise "should be interpreted above all as a consequence of the evolution of market rates and not as a reflection of a deterioration in the perception of Portuguese risk", and that the result shows "solid demand for Portuguese short-term public debt continues to exist, even in a context of higher yields and greater volatility in bond markets". Speaking to Negócios he put the same point in terms of the euro area, saying the increase reflects the rise in short-term rates across the bloc as expectations for European Central Bank policy have shifted. The bid-to-cover of roughly 2.2 supports him.

Ten-Year Yields Eased Everywhere, and Portugal's Spread Over the Bund Narrowed to 38 Basis Points

The short end repriced on Wednesday and the long end went the other way. Every ten-year yield tracked here fell. On TradingEconomics quotes stamped 16 September, Portugal eased two basis points to 3.89 percent, Germany eased two to 3.51, Spain eased four to 3.98, Italy eased four to 4.38, France eased three to 4.48 and Greece eased two to 4.27. The American ten-year eased four basis points to 4.97 percent, back below the 5 percent line it crossed on Monday for the first time since June 2007.

Portugal's spread over the Bund works out at 38 basis points, in from 39 on Tuesday. Recomputed from those six levels, Portugal now trades 9 basis points inside Spain, 38 inside Greece, 49 inside Italy and 59 inside France. The ranking has not moved in a week; only the absolute levels have.

It was not a calm morning before it became a calm afternoon. ECO's markets desk noted at 09:49 that German Bund yields were at 17-year highs, and that Italian inflation for August had been confirmed at its highest in three years. The easing came later in the session, with the oil price. It is worth being precise about that sequence, because a day that ends with yields lower is not the same as a day that never threatened to go the other way.

On the euro there is almost nothing to report, which is itself notable after three sessions of decline. The European Central Bank's daily reference rate fixed at 1.1537 dollars on 16 September, against 1.1539 on 15 September: a fall of 0.02 percent. Sterling moved a little further, with the euro at 0.85740 pounds against 0.85580 a day earlier. For context, the euro was worth 1.1592 dollars as recently as 11 September, so the cumulative slide over four sessions is 0.47 percent and almost all of it happened in the first two.

No fresh Euribor fixing was published in a source we use before this briefing closed, so Monday's sharp rise and Tuesday's continued drift remain the latest mortgage-relevant figures on record here.

KKR Is in Exclusive Talks for Logoplaste After Apax Walked Away

The American private equity house KKR is the preferred bidder for Logoplaste, the Cascais packaging manufacturer, and is in exclusive negotiations with its owners after the British fund Apax Partners dropped out. Bloomberg reported it on Wednesday, citing people familiar with the matter, and both ECO and Jornal de Negócios carried it. A deal could be signed within weeks.

This is the second stage of a process we covered on 15 July, when KKR and Apax were the two names that had put in non-binding offers. Apax decided not to go forward into the second round, which leaves KKR alone at the table. That is a materially weaker position for the sellers than a two-horse race, and it is the reason the story is worth returning to.

The seller is the Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan, which holds 60 percent and began weighing an exit in October. The remaining 40 percent sits with the families of Filipe de Botton and Alexandre Relvas. When OTPP started the process the company was valued at more than 1.7 billion euros.

Logoplaste is one of the quieter large Portuguese industrial businesses. Founded in 1976 by Marcel de Button, headquartered in Cascais, it makes rigid plastic packaging inside its customers' own factories, runs more than 60 plants in 17 countries and turned over roughly 1,000 million euros in 2024. Its customers include Kraft Heinz, Diageo and L'Oréal. It changed leadership last year, hiring Sandra Santos, a long-serving BA Glass executive, as chief executive.

Buying the State's REN Stake on the Open Market Would Have Taken Up to 730 Trading Days

A second document from the REN file surfaced on Wednesday, and it answers the obvious question about the state's purchase of Pontegadea's 13.7 percent stake: why buy a block at a premium instead of accumulating shares on the market?

CaixaBI was asked to analyse exactly that. In a study dated 31 July 2026, which ECO's Capital Verde desk read inside the Tribunal de Contas (Court of Auditors) prior-approval file, the investment bank calls market accumulation of a stake that size "hardly feasible". REN's shares are thinly traded and closely held, so sustained buying would push the price up against the buyer. The analysts estimate it would take roughly 570 to 730 trading days, two years of sessions, to assemble 13.7 percent without moving the price significantly.

On the price actually paid, CaixaBI put the appropriate premium at between 13.9 and 16.3 percent over the six-month volume-weighted average price, with a central figure of 15.1 percent. The bottom of that range corresponds to 4.19 euros a share and the central case to 4.24 euros. The bank also stresses what a 13.7 percent holding buys that a smaller one does not: no control, but a seat on the board, direct influence and closer sight of the investment plan.

REN closed up 0.86 percent at 3.515 euros on Wednesday. A separate ECO piece the same morning reports that the dividend, which the paper describes as historically attractive, was a relevant factor in the state's decision to re-enter the company.

Six Bidders Have Until Monday to Put a Number on Azores Airlines

SATA Holding announced on Wednesday that six of the eight parties that registered interest in Azores Airlines have met the requirements in the tender documents, and have been invited to submit non-binding proposals by 21 September. That is Monday.

The regional government is selling at least 75 percent of the carrier, by private negotiation rather than international public tender, under a restructuring plan Brussels approved in June 2022 in exchange for 453.25 million euros of state aid. The sale should have been completed in 2015; the Commission has allowed the deadline to run to the end of this year. The previous attempt, with the Atlantic Connect Group of Tiago Raiano, Carlos Tavares (the former Stellantis chief executive), Paulo Pereira and Nuno Pereira offering 17 million euros for 85 percent, was annulled by SATA on the jury's recommendation and is now in court.

What the six will be pricing is a first half that lost 37.1 million euros, an improvement of 3.9 million on the same period last year. Operating revenue was 134.4 million, down 1 percent, against operating costs of 142 million. The airline carried about 701,000 passengers, down 7.7 percent, on 5,037 flights, down 8.1 percent. A shrinking airline losing less money is a harder thing to value than either a growing one or a collapsing one, and four days is not long to do it in.

Hovione Spends 100 Million Dollars in the United States, and Employers Plan 3.4 Percent Pay Rises

Hovione is putting 100 million dollars into a new American unit that will double its spray-drying capacity, and expects the plant to lift group revenues by up to 10 percent once it reaches cruising speed. The United States is now the company's largest market. The Portuguese pharmaceutical manufacturer first landed there days after the September 2001 attacks, and the new investment marks a quarter of a century in the country. It follows the 200 million euro medicines plant at Seixal announced in July, due to open in 2027.

On pay, the recruitment consultancy Korn Ferry surveyed more than a hundred companies operating in Portugal and found that 99 percent of them intend to raise salaries next year, with an average increase of 3.4 percent. That is slightly above what was estimated and actually paid in 2026. Information technology leads again at 4.5 percent, followed by oil and gas at 4.3 percent, and construction, construction materials and transport at 3.6 percent.

The detail worth holding on to is which jobs move most. Korn Ferry puts base administrative and operational roles at 3.6 percent, the highest of any functional group, and attributes it to pressure from the minimum wage and the need to preserve differentials above it. More than six in ten firms say inflation still shapes their intentions; 32 percent cite difficulty retaining staff. Of the increases planned for 2026, 68 percent were delivered as announced and 16 percent came in below.

Also: BCP at an Eleven-Year High, an AI Licensing Platform, and the Supreme Court Again Sides With the Bank of Portugal

BCP closed up 0.55 percent at 1.1875 euros, its highest since May 2015. Both Mediobanca and Intesa Sanpaolo raised their price targets on Wednesday. Yesterday's briefing carried the Mediobanca move, to 1.29 euros from 1.18; what is new is that a second house has followed, and that the shares are now at an eleven-year high rather than approaching one.

The minister for state reform, Gonçalo Saraiva Matias, said the government is building a platform called Licencia com Inteligência Artificial (License With Artificial Intelligence) to serve as the single entry point for construction, environmental and industrial licensing, and expects it to cut licensing times in Portugal by at least 60 percent. The new construction regime takes effect at the end of this month. Artificial intelligence would handle preparation and processing of files; the final decision stays with a human. Speaking at a conference in ECO's studio, he framed the low adoption of AI among Portuguese companies, 99 percent of which are small or medium-sized, as headroom rather than a handicap.

And the Supremo Tribunal Administrativo (Supreme Administrative Court) has again rejected the large international BES funds in their 2,200 million euro dispute with the Banco de Portugal (Bank of Portugal), refusing their bid to annul its own earlier ruling. The case concerns the retransmission of bonds from Novo Banco back to the "bad bank" left over from BES, which happened more than ten years ago, and the court had already dismissed an appeal from the same funds in May. ECO's Advocatus desk reported it on Wednesday morning.

Thursday

Everything waits on Washington. The Federal Reserve concludes its meeting on Wednesday evening Lisbon time, and Jornal de Negócios reports that more than 90 percent of the market expects a 25 basis point increase, which would be the first rise in the federal funds rate since July 2023. Wall Street opened mixed ahead of it, with the S&P 500 up 0.24 percent, the Nasdaq up 0.42 percent and the Dow Jones down 0.11 percent. Thursday will show whether Wednesday's relief in European bonds was the start of something or a pause; ECO reports the market now expects two further European Central Bank increases by the end of the year, while Negócios cites an expectation of four rises totalling a full percentage point during 2027. And Lisbon opens ten points below the top of its published 52-week range, close enough that the direction of the American decision, rather than anything domestic, is likely to decide whether it gets there.