Galery

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A list with the 30 major Greek shareholders of the Athens stock exchange was published by the Greek press in the beginning of December 2009. The study shows a current photo of the major figures on the market, however does not exclude a change in the positions of those, who own substantial shares (over 5%), that cost millions of Euro at that particular time. The chart does not include shares owned foundations.

Exceptions are only the consolidated assets when an investor owns company X, which company owns shares in another company Y and both of the companies are listed on the stock exchange. The value of the assets of the shareholders is calculated on the basis of the market price of the shares from July 6^th 2009. Some Greek names are missing from the list due to double citizenship or because they take part in the World Greek Rich List, like David – Levedis from the family of Coca Cola HBC, who are usually listed in the British edition of the Richest Greek People in UK.

The sources include Business File, Economiki, Epitheorissi, The Vovolini Archive, Naftialiki, Greek Shipping Review, Lloyd’s List, the Financial Mirror and other media. Information is also given by the Foundation of the Hellenic World, the agencies for financial and economic analysis Hellastat and ICAP as well as the public relations departments of different investors and financial analyzers. 

First in the list is Spiros Latsis and family whose assets are valued at 2.6 billion Euro. Taking over the business of his deceased father Capitan Yanis Latsis, at the last ten years Spiros extends the family business by investing successfully in shipping and petrol and parallel to that he develops active philanthropic activity.

The Latsis Holding group owns EFG Group, based in Geneva. Branches of the corporation exist all over the world. It also owns 44% from the second biggest commercial bank in Greece – EFG Eurogbank Greece. The family has 36% indirect share of the stock exchange participant Hellenic Petroleum, a joint venture with governmental owning who manages large scale project on the Balkan peninsula. Latsis owns the Luxembourg based company Lamda Developments whose main activities include the construction and trade with real estate properties and large trade centers. Other activities of the family corporation include Private – Sea and Private-Jet, companies that offer services with luxurious yachts and airplanes. The sixty two years old Spiros Latsis has a PHD in economic sciences from the London School of Economics and is taking the 149^th place in the Forbs chart on the Planet’s wealthiest people.

Second in the list of the Greek millionaires are the families Kannelopoulos and Papalexopoulou with a capital of 607 million Euro. The roots of the two of the most resistant in time corporations could be traced as early as the ed of the 19^th and the beginning of the 20^th century, when a small group of students from the Polytechnic university of Zurich come back in Greece with new business ideas. The elite group was know as the “circle from Zurich” and included Nikolaos Kannelopoulos, Andreas Hadjikyriakos, Leonidas Economides and Alexandros Zachariou. The friends join their forces in 1902 and form a company for the production of cement, which they call “Hadjikyriakos, Zachariou and Co.” and later change the name to TITAN. The present chairman of the TITAN corporation is Andreas Kanneolopoulos, who along with his family (his nephew Dimitris Alexopoulos is the executive director of the corporation since 1996) own 40% of TITAN Cement – the mother company with strong export and well developed vertically group of branches all over the world.  

Vardis Vardinogiannis and his family are third in the list of the wealthiest men in Greece with his 560 million Euro. Vardinogiannis is a Greek petroleum magnate, president of the company Motor Oil Hellas, founded by his family in the beginning of the 70s of the 20^th century. Motor Oil Hellas trades with petroleum based products on the local as well as on the world market and distributes refined products through a network of gas stations of its subsidiary company Avin Oil. The company also sells fuel for airplanes. Other activities of the family spread out to the publishing industry, television, radio and logistics. The second generation of the family, Ioannis Vardinogiannis is the owner of the biggest percent of shares of the Crete company Sea Star Capital which controls the two largest sea carriers ANEK Hellenic Seaways. The family origins from the island of Crete and runs an active charity activity, politics and football.

Fourth in the list are the Greek rich men Nikos and Evangelos Stasinopoulos with 405 million euro. Their holding company Vihalco produces and trades with copper, steel and aluminum and has 80 years of history. The holding owns over 90 companies, 6 of which are listed on the Athens Stock Exchange and has production facilities in the UK, Greece and other Balkan countries. Nikos is the chairman of Vihalco and has 7,2 % voting rights (the shares are anonymous). His brother Evangelos has 35% voting rights in Vihalco, 8,2% voting rights (anonymous shares) from Elva – a company for production of flat rolled aluminum products as well as 9,3% voting rights (anonymous shares) of Halcor – a corporation producing and processing copper alloy.