VIENNA (dpa-AFX) – The Vienna Stock Exchange closed on Monday with a weaker trend. The ATX fell 0.49 percent to 3305.35 units. The leading European stock exchanges, however, were mostly friendly at the beginning of the week. The US stock markets started the session inconsistently.
Market participants spoke of subdued business and, on the one hand, pointed to the very poor reporting situation from companies. On the other hand, the data calendar was hardly full on Monday and therefore did not provide any significant stimulus.
However, there are still a number of central bank decisions on the agenda during the week. Among other things, the monetary authorities in the USA, the Eurozone and Great Britain decide on their further course.
However, no interest rate steps are expected from the US Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank before Christmas. The respective meetings are crucial for the market’s expectations as to when and how significantly interest rates will be reduced in the new year, wrote analyst Michael Hewson from broker CMC Markets.
Analyst comments caused some movement among the individual stocks. Verbund closed at the lower end of the price list with a loss of 4.8 percent to 83.05 euros. According to a market observer, UBS is starting the evaluation of utility stocks with a “Sell” rating and a price target of EUR 77.50.
EVN stocks fell by 0.9 percent. When it comes to oil stocks, OMV shares fell by 0.4 percent. Schoeller-Bleckmann closed 0.2 percent lower.
Strabag, on the other hand, gained 1.2 percent to 38.50 euros. The analysts at Erste Group (Erste Group Bank) have slightly increased their price target for the shares from 54.7 to 55.0 euros after slight adjustments to their forecasts. The “Buy” recommendation was confirmed for the shares of the construction group.
Among the bank stocks, Raiffeisen shares rose by almost one percent, while BAWAG stood still with minus 0.04 percent. Erste Group went out of trading down 0.5 percent./ger/sto/APA/ngu