Newsquawk Daily European Equity Opening News - 20th June 2024

20th June 2024

ASIA

APAC stocks were subdued in rangebound trade amid a lack of catalysts and following the US holiday lull. ASX 200 was lacklustre as underperformance in defensives outweighed the gains in energy and real estate. Nikkei 225 retreated with weakness in the heavy industries clouding over exporter optimism. Hang Seng and Shanghai Comp. were lower with the former choppy amid resistance around 18,500, while the mainland was uninspired after China's Loan Prime Rates were unsurprisingly kept unchanged and the PBoC also reverted to a tepid liquidity operation.

EUROPEAN CLOSES

CLOSES: DAX: -0.27% at 18,076, CAC 40: -0.77% at 7,570, PSI: -0.44% at 6,542, FTSE 100: +0.16% at 8,204, IBEX 35: flat at 11, 060, FTSE MIB: -0.31% at 33,213, SMI: +0.14% at 12,057, Euro Stoxx 50: -0.59% at 4,887.

SECTORS: Materials 0.20%, Telecoms 0.17%, Financials 0.10%, Consumer Disc -0.04%, Utilities -0.14%, Consumer Stpl -0.20%, Energy -0.22%, Healthcare -0.23%, Industrials -0.30%, IT -1.35%

FTSE 100

Ex-Dividends - Persimmon (PSN LN), Airtel Africa (AAF LN), 3i (III LN), Experian (EXPN LN), United Utilities (UU/ LN) will trade without entitlement to their latest dividend payout. (Newswires)

NatWest (NWG LN) - Co. intends to close its Polish operation and will exit the region by the end of 2025, via FT citing sources. (FT)

Shell (SHEL LN) - A non-binding French Senate report suggested the French government should acquire a "golden share" in TotalEnergies to influence strategic decisions, ensure alignment with the Paris Climate Accord, and veto potential relocations to the US. The report followed six months of hearings on TotalEnergies' global activities and their alignment with France's climate objectives. (Newswires)

OTHER UK COMPANIES

BROKER MOVES

DAX

Deutsche Bank (DBK GY) - Co. has cut spending on external consultants by 70% within the private bank unit, as it works to become more profitable. (FT)

OTHER GERMAN COMPANIES

BROKER MOVES

CAC

Technip Energies (TE FP) – Awarded a significant contract for IOCL’s Grassroot cracking unit in India; contract award representing between EUR 50-250mln of revenue. (Newswires)

Legrand (LR FP) - Co. announced a EUR 600mln bond issue maturing in 2034. (Newswires)

OTHER FRENCH COMPANIES

Alstom (ALO FP) – Co. signed a EUR 323mln contract with the Polo Logita FS to supply 70 Traxx Universal Locomotives with maintenance services. First deliveries are to begin in 2025. (Newswires)

Vallourec (VK FP) – Extended its contract by 2 years with Abu Dhabi’s NOC; contract was originally worth around USD 900mln. (Newswires)

BROKER MOVES

Klepierre (LI FP) upgraded to Buy from Hold at HSBC

Thales (HO FP) downgraded to Underweight from Equal Weight at Barclays

PAN EUROPE

Defence Names – France, Belgium, Estonia, Cyprus and Hungary signed a cooperation agreement to buy Mistral missiles; the overall volume should exceed 1,500 missiles. (Newswires) Mistral missiles are produced by MBDA; parent organisations include Airbus (AIR FP) and Leonardo (LDO IM).

EU Stocks - A Bloomberg piece suggests China is preparing retaliatory measures against the European Union's proposed tariffs on Chinese EVs, with multiple sectors at risk of being targeted. Brandy, pork, wine, cars, and dairy are among some goods flagged by the article, whilst planes are unlikely to be targeted as there are only two major suppliers - Airbus (AIR FP) and Boeing (BA). (Bloomberg)

Ferrovial (FER SM) – Announced the ratio and number of shares to be issued in the interim scrip dividend; ratio of EUR 0.3033/shr. (Newswires)

Leonardo (LDO IM) – Announced the disposal of its stake in Industria Autobus Industrial. (Newswires)

BROKER MOVES

ASM International (ASM NA) upgraded to Overweight from Equal Weight at Morgan Stanley

SMI

Kuehne und Nagel International (KNIN SW) – Establishing a new logistics platform for the fast-growing French fashion brand, Sezane. (Newswires)

Roche (ROG SW) - Roche launched a new highly-sensitive test to more easily diagnose patients who may have B-cell lymphoma. (Roche)

UBS (UBSG SW) - Swiss National Bank said in its financial stability report that the situation of the former Credit Suisse entities has stabilised with the acquisition by UBS. Said the crisis at Credit Suisse has shown that the treatment of a parent bank’s participation in its subsidiaries should be improved. (Newswires)

OTHER SWISS COMPANIES

BROKER MOVES

VAT Group (VACN SW) downgraded to Equal Weight from Overweight at Morgan Stanley

SCANDINAVIA

Fortnox (FNOX SS) - CFO told the FT that they made a mistake when using numbers that understated its market dominance in market share data within 2021 and 2024. Co. has since restated the figures. (FT)

Sweco (SWECB SS) – Co. signed a contract with Volth2 as its partner for the design and development of a new hydrogen plant in the Netherlands. (Newswires)

BROKER MOVES

US - Closed on Wednesday

Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) - Believes a limited amount of information related to specifications used to assemble certain AMD products was accessed on a third-party site but does not believe this data breach will have a material impact on its business. (Newswires)

Discover Financial (DFS)/ KKR (KKR) - Carlyle and KKR vie for Discover Financial's USD 10bln portfolio of US student loans, according to FT. (FT)

20 Jun 2024 - 06:46- Research Sheet- Source: Newsquawk