(Boursier.com) — THE TREND
Few movements on the CAC40 since the opening but a slight increase still takes over at the end of the morning (+0.3%), allowing the Parisian index to reach 7,300 points.
While the American Federal Reserve must make its monetary policy decisions in the evening, this meeting will occupy the minds of investors throughout the session which therefore promises to be a wait-and-see attitude. There is little suspense over the decision on expected stable US rates, but investors are mainly hoping that the US central bank will immediately confirm that rates have now reached their terminal level, which underlies a new pause for the November meeting. Verdict after 8:30 p.m. with the speech of J. Powell, the boss of the Fed!
RISING VALUES
* In a wait-and-see market, Societe Generale rebounded by 2% to 23.6 euros after its big decline at the start of the week. The bank’s new business plan has not been well received by operators, with the stock underperforming the sector by 12 points since Monday’s presentation, Berenberg points out. The broker believes the lack of significant change in the bank’s strategic direction has extinguished growing hopes for more ambitious plans. Revenue growth targets are moderate, although based on conservative assumptions, while rationalization of the cost base could have been more aggressive, he said. As such, the broker believes that the potential to reduce Société Générale’s steep valuation discount to its peers is limited, as profitability and capital distributions are expected to continue to lag the sector. He thus reiterates his ‘keep’ opinion and reduces his price target from 30 to 27.5 euros.
* Renault gains 0.8% and Stellantis 1.6%. The European automobile market remained dynamic in August. Sales in the European Union increased by 21%, reaching 787,626 units, marking the thirteenth consecutive month of growth. Although August is generally a slower month for the sector, double-digit gains indicate that the European market continues to recover after last year’s slump linked in particular to component shortages, underlines the Association of European Automobile Manufacturers. Over the first eight months of 2023, registrations of new cars in the EU increased significantly (+17.9%), reaching 7.1 million units. Despite this strong improvement, the market remains behind its pre-pandemic level (9 million units sold in 2019).
* Air France KLM gained 3.7% to 12.6 euros. While ‘Les Echos’ affirmed that the government had abandoned the idea of an increase in the “ecotax” on plane tickets, Clément Beaune, the Minister of Transport, indicated on ‘France Info’ that “the Discussions are continuing since the finance bill will be presented next week. Taxing airports or plane tickets are options under study, the minister said.
* Ubisoft stands out with an increase of 6% to 30 euros, the highest since the beginning of August. The video game publisher is supported by the first largely positive feedback for its game ‘The Crew Motorfest’. The latest installment in the series ‘The Crew’ earned a score of 75 out of 100 on Metacritic, a rating deemed “generally favorable”. A total of 181 users rate the game 8 out of 10 on average, according to Metacritic. For comparison, The Crew 2 had a rating of 64 in 2018 and a score of 5.7 based on 421 user reviews on Metacritic. The game is now available on PlayStation5, PlayStation4, Xbox Series X/S and Xbox One, as well as on Windows PC via the Epic Games Store and Ubisoft Store.
FALLING VALUES
* LVMH And Kering yielded 0.2% and 0.7% respectively. The two luxury players were downgraded by Jefferies this morning, with the broker citing risks linked to the slowdown in the United States and the lack of recovery in Chinese consumer spending. Jefferies has therefore lowered its recommendation on the two groups to ‘keep’. Concerning LVMH, it cut its target from 960 to 780 euros while the objective for Kering was reduced from 655 to 500 euros.
* At the all-time high yesterday, TotalEnergies returns 1.5% to 62.1 euros. The barrel of oil interrupted its rise towards 100 dollars with Brent falling to 93 dollars.
* Same scenario for Tehnip Energies which lost 1% again to 23.2 euros after reaching a new high yesterday as an independent engineering company split from TechnipFMC in 2021.