Ams : Two Greek banks dropped from top European equity index

PARIS (Reuters) - Greek lenders Bank of Piraeus (>> Piraeus Bank SA) and Eurobank (>> Eurobank Ergasias SA) will drop out of the pan-European STOXX 600 benchmark, index compiler STOXX said late on Tuesday.

PARIS (Reuters) - Greek lenders Bank of Piraeus (>> Piraeus Bank SA) and Eurobank (>> Eurobank Ergasias SA) will drop out of the pan-European STOXX 600 <.STOXX> benchmark, index compiler STOXX said late on Tuesday.

Despite a recent rebound, shares in the two banks are down around 65 percent since February 2014, hurt by worries over Greece's debt pile.

The index provider, which uses criteria such as market capitalization and free float to rank stocks, said Rhoen Klinikum (>> Rhoen-Klinikum AG), Premier Oil (>> Premier Oil PLC), Ophir Energy (>> Ophir Energy Plc), Hunting (>> Hunting plc) and Nutreco (>> NUTRECO) will also be dropped from the STOXX 600.

AMS (>> ams AG), Faurecia (>> FAURECIA), WH Smith (>> WH Smith Plc), Beazley (>> Beazley PLC), Duerr (>> Duerr AG), Restaurant GRP (>> Restaurant Group PLC) and Grafton will be added to the index.

Changes will be effective as of the open of markets on March 23.

(Reporting by Blaise Robinson; Editing by Atul Prakash)

Stocks treated in this article : FAURECIA, Duerr AG, Rhoen-Klinikum AG, Piraeus Bank SA, Eurobank Ergasias SA, Hunting plc, Beazley PLC, Premier Oil PLC, Ophir Energy Plc, WH Smith Plc, Restaurant Group PLC, NUTRECO, ams AG