Before the interest rate decisions of the major central banks, investors on the German stock market did not dare to take any big leaps. The leading index, the Dax, rose by 0.12 percent in early trading on Wednesday to 15,145.98 points after it had already practically stopped on Tuesday after successfully testing the 15,000 point mark. The MDax rose by 0.3 percent to 28,899.65 points in the middle of the week. The EuroStoxx 50, the leading index in the euro zone, rose by 0.25 percent.

In the evening (CET), the US Federal Reserve will announce its interest rate decision, followed by the European Central Bank and the Bank of England on Thursday. There are signs of further interest rate hikes in view of comparatively high inflation and a strong labor market in the USA.

Software vendor stocks tumbled. Software AG's shares at the end of the MDax fell by a good 13 percent. The company did well at the end of the year and was able to meet its own targets - but the profits targeted for the new year fall short of the expectations of experts.

Teamviewer shares lost more than eight percent after a skeptical analyst comment. Rising investment threatened to erode profitability, wrote JP Morgan expert Toby Ogg. The market expectations for this year are too optimistic.

At the end of the Dax, Hannover Re shares lost almost four percent and thus suffered from a cautious outlook. The goal of an annual surplus of at least 1.7 billion euros could be disappointing, wrote analyst Thorsten Wenzel from DZ Bank.

The news also weighed on the European insurance sector as a whole. The papers of Munich Re and Talanx each fell by around two percent.