DAX Modestly Lower In Cautious Trade

(RTTNews) - German stocks are modestly lower on Wednesday with investors mostly making cautious moves, looking for directional clues after recent gains on the back of U.S. President Donald Trump's decision to pause tariffs on EU goods till July 9th.

The German market had climbed to a new record high on Tuesday after the German government said it will ramp up public investment to 110 billion euros this year to revive a sluggish economy.

The benchmark DAX was down 76.76 points or 0.32% at 24,181.52 a few minutes before noon.

Daimler Truck Holding is declining 4.7%. Zalando is down 2.5%, Bayer is lower by about 1.7% and Heidelberg Materials is down by about 1.6%.

Commerzbank, SAP, Deutsche Bank, Siemens, Munich Re, Fresenius, Fresenius Medical Care, Allianz, Infineon Technologies, Hannover Rueck, Henkel, E.ON and BASF are down 0.6 to 1.2%.

Among the gainers, Rheinmetall is advancing nearly 2%. MTU Aero Engines is up 1.5% and Qiagen is rising 1.3%. Brenntag, Vonovia, Continental, Siemens Energy and Volkswagen are up with moderate gains.

In economic news, data from Destatis showed German import prices declined for the first time in six months in April due to the sharp fall in energy prices. Import prices registered an annual fall of 0.4% in April, in contrast to the 2.1% increase in March.

The 11.2% fall in energy prices had the biggest impact on overall development of import prices. Excluding energy prices, import prices rose 0.8% from the last year.

On a monthly basis, import prices were down 1.7%, marking the biggest fall since the start of the Covid-19 crisis in April 2020.

Data showed that export prices grew 1% but weaker than the 2% rise in March. Month-on-month, export prices fell 0.5%.

Meanwhile, Germany's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate held steady at 6.3% in May, the highest since September 2020 and matching forecasts.