German stocks advanced, led by MAN AG on takeover speculation after it dropped its hostile bid for Swedish rival Scania AB. E.ON AG and RWE AG also gained.
The benchmark DAX Index rose 35.79, or 0.5 percent, to 6714.72 as of 12:07 p.m. in Frankfurt. DAX futures expiring in March climbed 37, or 0.5 percent, to 6750.5. The HDAX Index of the country's 110 biggest companies increased 19.78, or 0.6 percent, to 3473.46.
MAN advanced 2.72 euros, or 3.6 percent, to 78.51 euros after Europe's third-largest truckmaker dropped its 10.3 billion- euro ($13.4 billion) bid for Scania.
``MAN shares extended gains after the rumor Volkswagen AG and Investor AB want to bid 85 euros per share did the rounds,'' said Joerg Treptow, a trader at M.M. Warburg & Co. in Hamburg.
Andreas Meurer, a spokesman for Wolfsburg, Germany-based Volkswagen, today declined to comment on market ``rumors'' about a potential takeover offer for MAN.
MAN yesterday said that it will seek a friendly merger with Scania and that Volkswagen, the largest shareholder in both MAN and Scania, foresees ``the industrial logic behind a combination'' of the truckmakers. Investor AB Chairman Jacob Wallenberg said in an interview today that his company, Scania's second-biggest shareholder, backs ``amicable'' talks on a merger.
Volkswagen shares climbed 72 cents, or 0.9 percent, to 85.39 euros.
E.ON, the world's largest utility by sales, gained 1.93 euros, or 2 percent, to 99.93 euros after Endesa SA, the target of a 36.5 billion-euro bid by E.ON, beat its full-year earnings forecast and raised a profit goal for 2009.
RWE, Germany's second-biggest utility, climbed 2 euros, or 2.5 percent, to 81.39 euros.
The following stocks also rose or fell in the German market. Stock symbols are in parentheses.
GPC Biotech AG (GPC GY) added 18 cents, or 0.8 percent, to 22.2 euros. Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. sold as many as 1.56 million shares in the unprofitable German biotechnology company for 21.5 euros each to institutional investors, according to traders involved in the transaction.
Mark Lane, a spokesman for Lehman Brothers in London, wouldn't confirm or deny the sale price.
HVB Group (HVM GY) soared 1.76 euros, or 5.1 percent, to 36.32 euros, the biggest gain in the HDAX index. UniCredit SpA, Italy's biggest bank by assets, said it plans to buy the shares it doesn't already own in its HVB and Bank Austria Creditanstalt units.
Infineon Technologies AG (IFX GY), Europe's second-biggest semiconductor maker, fell 12 cents, or 1.1 percent, to 10.6 euros after profit and sales of its memory-chip unit Qimonda AG missed analysts' estimates for the fiscal first quarter.
Separately, Nanya Technology Corp., Taiwan's second-biggest memory-chip maker, reported a fourth-quarter net income of NT$6.47 billion ($197 million), lower than the median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of four analysts of NT$6.57 billion.
Kloeckner & Co. AG (KCO GY) dropped 2.17 euros, or 6.2 percent, to 33.08 euros. Deutsche Bank AG and JPMorgan Chase & Co. are selling as many as 13.8 million shares in Kloeckner, a German steel trader, for between 32 euros and 33.5 euros each, according to traders involved in the transaction.
Magix AG (MGX GY) fell 69 cents, or 8.5 percent, to 7.48 euros. The software maker reported first-quarter sales of 9.7 million euros and earnings before interest and taxes of 1.9 million euros.
Puma AG (PUM GY) retreated 1.35 euros, or 0.5 percent, to 284.89 euros. UniCredit Markets & Investment Banking (HVB) lowered its recommendation for shares of Europe's second-largest sporting-goods maker to ``hold'' from ``buy'' and cut its price estimate by 15 percent to 306 euros.
``We expect Puma stock to show no more than a moderate performance,'' Uwe Weinreich, an analyst at UniCredit in Munich, wrote in a report published yesterday after the close.
SAP AG (SAP GY) dropped 1.88 euros, or 4.9 percent, to 36.49 euros, the steepest decline amongst members of the HDAX index. The world's largest business-management software maker forecast the first decline in its profit margin in seven years as the company invests in a division to focus on small customers.
Operating profit as a percentage of sales, after some adjustments, will drop as much as 1.3 percentage points this year from 27.3 percent in 2006, SAP said in a statement today.
Siemens AG (SIE GY) slipped 66 cents, or 0.9 percent, to 75.89 euros. Europe's largest engineering company is among a group of electric equipment makers fined about 750 million euros by European Union regulators for price fixing, Reuters said, citing an unidentified person close to the situation.
No comments:
Post a Comment