Dax at record high, Deutsche Bank shares rally on the stock market

Highlights: The Dax rose by 0.5 percent to up to 18,475 points in the middle of the week, thus reaching a new record high. Deutsche Bank shares temporarily reached their highest level in six years. Oil prices, on the other hand, are extending their previous day's losses. Investors are primarily focusing on Friday's data on personal consumer spending in the USA, which is the Fed's preferred inflation measure. The US stock exchanges gave up their profits on Tuesday after friendly trading and closed somewhat weaker.

The Dax marks another record high on Wednesday. Deutsche Bank shares temporarily reached their highest level in six years. Oil prices, on the other hand, are extending their previous day's losses.

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Frankfurt Stock Exchange:

The DAX continues its price rally

Photo: Daniel Reinhardt/picture alliance/dpa

Ahead of the long Easter weekend, stock investors in Europe are still in a buying mood. The Dax rose by 0.5 percent to up to 18,475 points in the middle of the week, thus reaching a new record high. Only the day before did it break the 18,400 mark for the first time. Above all, the prospect of falling interest rates has been driving prices up for weeks. The EuroStoxx50 rose by 0.4 percent to around 5,085 points.

Investors are primarily focusing on Friday's data on personal consumer spending in the USA, which is the Fed's preferred inflation measure. Investors hope that they will provide further information about the timing of the Federal Reserve's expected interest rate turnaround. The monetary authorities had combated the high rate of inflation by raising interest rates. The US central bankers recently kept their monetary policy stable and signaled several interest rate cuts this year.

Upgrade drives Deutsche Bank shares

Meanwhile, an upgrade temporarily drove Deutsche Bank shares to their highest level in more than six years. The financial group's shares rose by 3.9 percent to 14.78 euros, making them one of the biggest DAX winners. The US bank Morgan Stanley set the shares to “Overweight” from “Equal-Weight” and raised the price target to 18 from 17 euros.

Mood in the Eurozone is brightening

There was also tailwind from the economic side. As expected, the mood in the euro zone economy brightened in March. The barometer for the business climate rose by 0.8 to 96.3 points. The mood in construction stabilized. It brightened among retailers, in the service sector and in industry. Consumer sentiment also improved as inflation declined. In contrast, the leading research institutes have shortened their forecast for the German economy and are only expecting an increase of 0.1 percent in 2024, i.e. actually stagnation.

Cocoa is now more expensive than copper

In contrast, cocoa prices jumped to a new record high shortly before Easter. The futures contract traded in London rose by up to 0.4 percent to 7,645 pounds sterling per tonne, a new all-time high, before falling slightly again. A ton of cocoa therefore costs more than the same amount of copper. Anyone who hasn't kept stocks will now have to stock up at every conceivable price in order to avoid expensive production stops, said a stockbroker.

Aroundtown fluctuates a lot - and has recently increased significantly

In terms of individual stocks, Aroundtown initially fell by more than ten percent before the titles moved from last place to the top of the MDax and increased by up to ten percent. The commercial real estate investor is once again not paying a dividend after value adjustments worth billions on his portfolio. That frightened investors, said one trader. However, the step was generally expected.

Wall Street gives back early gains

The US stock exchanges gave up their profits on Tuesday after friendly trading and closed somewhat weaker. Since the most recent record highs last Thursday, the series of slight setbacks has continued. Nevertheless, there has been no noticeable willingness to sell so far in the week before Easter.

The moderate selling pressure emerged for the US indices in the last hour of trading. The previously published economic data was mixed and therefore had little impact.

The

Dow Jones Industrial

ultimately lost 0.08 percent to 39,282 points. The week before, the best-known Wall Street index had reached a record level of just under 39,900 points and benefited from continued interest rate optimism following the US Federal Reserve's latest monetary policy statements. Although the Fed kept interest rates unchanged on Wednesday a week ago, it also estimated three cuts this year. The market-wide

S&P 500

fell 0.28 percent to 5,203 points on Tuesday. The

Nasdaq 100,

which is dominated by technology stocks,

fell by 0.36 percent to 18,210 points. These two indices also reached record highs on Thursday.

Oil prices extend previous day's losses

Oil prices extended their losses from the previous day on Wednesday. In the morning, a barrel (159 liters) of North Sea

Brent

for delivery in May cost $85.43. That was 82 cents less than the evening before. The price of a barrel of US West Texas Intermediate (

WTI

) fell 76 cents to $80.86.

The recently rising dollar exchange rate put pressure on oil prices. In the oil market, a stronger dollar usually causes demand to fall. The decisive factor is exchange rate effects, which ultimately make purchasing crude oil more expensive for interested parties.

Oil prices were additionally impacted by inventory data from the USA. According to figures from the American Petroleum Institute (API) on Tuesday evening, crude oil inventories rose sharply by more than nine million barrels last week. On Wednesday afternoon, the US government will publish its weekly figures, which will be closely followed by the oil market.

With news agencies