In the “Black Book Stock Exchange” the investor protection community summarizes the biggest bankruptcies and scandals on the stock market. Which companies attracted negative attention last year.
Once again a bank, once again the bankers, the management and the supervision: the shares of the Swiss bank Credit Suisse were quoted at over 90 Swiss francs in 2007, and in the end the shareholders were fobbed off with 76 centimes – when it was taken over by the major bank UBS. Marc Liebscher, board member of the Investors’ Protection Association (SdK), says: “The necessary consequences were not drawn from the Credit Suisse case.”
Wind power disaster at Siemens Energy
But a company from the German stock index DAX has once again made it into the SdK’s black book: Siemens-Energy with the wind power disaster. In 2023, the share achieved a rare feat for a DAX stock twice: a daily loss of around a third. Siemens Energy is still in the leading German index. Is there hope now?
“Unfortunately, only the board of directors of Siemens Energy can answer that at the moment as to whether there is hope at Siemens Energy, because only they – we hope – have insight into what is going wrong at their subsidiary Gamesa,” says Liebscher.
And a former DAX company, the former Bavarian payment service provider Wirecard, also made it into the black book again after 2020. “What surprised us most was the slow pace of processing the Wirecard scandal,” said the SdK board. Scandals, grievances and bankruptcies – Wirecard is the largest economic scandal in the Federal Republic to date. The new Black Book criticizes that the reappraisal is not progressing quickly enough at all levels.
“Low Capital market expertise at authorities”
The SdK also points to further disappointments on the stock and bond markets – particularly with bonds from medium-sized companies. The protection community denounces the failure of the authorities. “In general, we have very little capital market competence among the German authorities. Be it in the courts or in the public prosecutor’s office,” says Liebscher. “Whenever we have distortions on the capital market, courts, public prosecutors, but also supervisory authorities such as BaFin are unable to cope.”
New laws don’t always help. The “StaRug” can be found in the Black Book – the law on the stabilization and restructuring framework for companies. From the SdK’s point of view, pressure from the financial lobby poses risks for private investors. “The StaRug provides useful opportunities to restructure companies, but it can also be misused to force shareholders out of the company in a non-transparent manner and against their will. And we fear that this will increase massively in 2024.”
Investing in ETFs reduces risks
Nevertheless, the important positive conclusion is that of SdK board member Marc Liebscher. “You shouldn’t draw conclusions about the stock and the stock market as a whole based on these individual catastrophes. That’s also a mistake that the Germans are very happy to make.”
For this reason, the protective association of capital investors also recommends investing your own money widely in funds or ETFs (Exchange Traded Funds) – especially at the beginning, before you also add individual stocks or bonds to your portfolio to a certain extent. The tip: Investors should always stay informed and stay on top of their own investments.
Jan Plate, HR, tagesschau, December 22nd, 2023 11:00 a.m