The Dax continued its recent rally on Monday. Supported in part by the ambitious long-term goals of the chip group Infineon, the German share index was able to cross the finish line by 0.62 percent to 14,313.30 points. Since the low for the year at the end of September, the leading index has recovered by more than a fifth.
"Firstly, the stock market is fueled by confidence that inflation has peaked and the Fed is not far from pausing rate hikes," wrote analyst Konstantin Oldenburger of brokerage CMC Markets. On the other hand, the fact that economic growth is not developing as badly as assumed in the summer also helps.
Against this background, the MDax rose by 1.27 percent on Monday to 26,304.83 points, while the EuroStoxx 50 rose by a good half a percent. The picture in European trading was somewhat better than in New York, where the leading indices started the new week on a rather mixed note. There was initially profit-taking on the Nasdaq stock exchange.
Infineon gave the leading index a certain boost during the course of the day, as the chip group's papers rose due to increased long-term goals. An increase of 7.8 percent was recorded in the end, which meant the top position in the Dax. Infineon expects sales growth of more than ten percent in the future. Profitability should also increase more significantly than planned.
Infineon edged out Merck KGaA, which was 4.4 percent higher, to second place. After Bank of America gave the shares of the pharmaceutical and chemical group a buy recommendation, they reached their highest level since mid-August. Analyst Sachin Jain was optimistic about the pharma pipeline and believes the stock is attractively valued.
Elsewhere in the pharmaceutical industry, however, there was a rude awakening: a bitter disappointment in an Alzheimer's drug candidate triggered a 29 percent price slump at Morphosys. The shares fell to their lowest level since 2010 after the Swiss licensing partner Roche had missed the targets set in its Alzheimer's program with the active ingredient gantenerumab.
Rheinmetall shares, on the other hand, rose by 6.7 percent after an announced acquisition. The automotive supplier and armaments group wants to expand its ammunition business with a takeover in Spain.
Adesso jumped 9.4 percent in the SDax small-value index. The IT service provider earned 30 percent more from operations in the third quarter thanks to the ongoing digitization trend. Henrik Paganetty from the analysis firm Jefferies spoke of strong indicators.
Before Adesso, Uniper was the biggest SDax winner with a plus of 17.5 percent. The shares of the energy group continued their steep recovery for the third trading day in a row. The fact that the EU Commission gave the green light for the nationalization of the former Gazprom subsidiary Securing Energy for Europe was viewed positively. Stockbrokers saw this as a positive indication of the approval of Uniper's nationalization under state aid.
The euro was last traded at $1.0331. The European Central Bank (ECB) had set the reference rate at 1.0319 (Friday: 1.0308) dollars. The dollar thus cost 0.9691 euros.
On the bond market, the current yield rose from 2.04 percent on Friday to 2.10 percent. The Rex pension index fell by 0.24 percent to 127.34 points. The Bund future was 0.02 percent higher at 138.74 points.
