market report
Below the mark of 16,000 points, the DAX continues to struggle. Even positive US targets cannot motivate investors to make new purchases. A number of company results are causing price movements.
A minus of 0.4 percent to 15,880 points is the level of the leading German index at the start of trading on XETRA. Like yesterday, the DAX is moving in a narrow trading range, with a slight downward trend. Yesterday the index recouped its daily loss thanks to a firm Wall Street.
In New York, the Dow Jones index of standard values closed 1.2 percent higher at 35,473 points. The tech-heavy Nasdaq advanced 0.6 percent to 13,994 points. In Asia, too, the markets tend to be rather friendly in the morning. The Nikkei index in Japan closed 0.4 percent higher at 32,377 points. The Shanghai Stock Exchange gained 0.1 percent.
Investors were not put off by weak economic data from China. After already sharp declines in the previous months, Chinese exports fell by 14.5 percent in July year-on-year in dollar terms, the customs authorities announced today in Beijing. The imports of the second largest economy fell by 12.4 percent. Both values were even worse than expected by analysts.
On the foreign exchange market, the euro continues to deteriorate against the dollar. In the morning, the 1.10 mark was at least temporarily reached again. Little movement in the morning also on the commodity market. Oil prices remained at a high level. A barrel of the US variety WTI currently costs 81.75 dollars. An ounce of gold is quoted at $1934.
Consumer prices rose by 6.2 percent in July compared to the same month last year, as the Federal Statistical Office announced today after a second estimate. A first survey was thus confirmed. In June, the annual inflation rate was 6.4 percent. “The inflation rate has weakened somewhat, but remains at a high level,” says Ruth Brand, President of the Federal Statistical Office. Thereafter, food price developments continued to fuel inflation.
In the DAX, the shares of Beiersdort and E.ON can still assert themselves with small gains in early trading. Papers from Deutsche Bank and Commerzbank are the biggest losers in the index, each down three percent.
The share of the chemical and pharmaceutical group loses around 1.5 percent. Depreciation in the agricultural business caused Bayer to lose billions in the second quarter. The bottom line was the minus at 1.88 billion euros after a loss of 298 million in the same period last year. However, the loss was somewhat lower than feared – Bayer had recently assumed a consolidated loss of around two billion euros. Bayer had already published preliminary quarterly figures two weeks ago and significantly lowered its annual targets.
On the German stock market, VW shares could draw attention in the morning. VW has recaptured the top position in pure electric cars in Germany from Tesla. With 41,475 first registrations in the first seven months of the year, the Wolfsburg brand is again just ahead of its US competitor, which came up with 40,289 cars, according to figures from the Federal Motor Transport Authority. At the end of the first half of 2022 and also for the whole of 2022, Tesla was still ahead.
A reduction in the profit forecast causes problems for the share of the TV group, which loses three percent in the MDAX. Due to the continuing slump in the advertising business, the company expects earnings before interest, taxes and goodwill amortization (Ebitda) of around 950 million euros for the full year, adjusted for special effects, and no longer 1 to 1.05 billion euros. In terms of sales, the Bertelsmann subsidiary expects around seven billion euros for the year as a whole – the previous forecast was between 7.3 and 7.4 billion euros. At EUR 132 million in the first six months, net profit was more than half that of the previous year.
A noticeable increase in demand from the automotive industry has given industrial supplier Norma a tailwind. With an increase in sales of 1.9 percent to 324 million euros, the adjusted operating result (EBIT) rose by 21.2 percent to 27.1 million euros in the second quarter, according to Norma. Company boss Guido Grandi confirmed his goals for the year, according to which organic group sales growth in the mid single-digit percentage range and an adjusted operating return on sales (EBIT margin) of around eight percent should be achieved.
The airport operator remains on the upswing after the difficult Corona years, and the share increases significantly in the morning. In the second quarter, the MDAX company earned EUR 102.3 million after EUR 59.2 million in the same period of the previous year. The group also trumped the analysts’ forecasts. According to the company, the number of passengers in the quarter in July was only 87 percent of the same month in the pre-Corona year 2019.
The US payment service Paypal now uses its own cryptocurrency. The digital money “Paypal USD” is linked to the US dollar and should be available to US customers of the company. The so-called “stablecoin” can be bought at a price of one dollar per unit and exchanged for the US currency, PayPal announced yesterday. The digital currency is secured, among other things, by dollars and short-term US government bonds. With the PayPal coins, users can, among other things, pay for purchases and send them to other users.
The financial investor KKR takes over the US book publisher Simon & Schuster from Paramount Global. The purchase price is $1.62 billion, Paramount announced yesterday. The transaction will be settled in cash. KKR competed for Simon & Schuster with publishing house HarperCollins, which is a News Corp subsidiary. The publishing house counts Stephen King and Hillary Clinton among its authors. Paramount shares rose seven percent in after-hours trading.