There is no longer a German company among the 100 most valuable companies in the world. By the end of 2022, global stock markets will be more dominated than ever by US corporations, although technology companies have fallen sharply in value over the past 12 months, according to an analysis by EY management consultants on Thursday.
Eleven of the 12 most expensive publicly traded companies (as of the close of December 27) are based in the US, led by iPhone maker Apple, which is the only one to surpass the 2 trillion mark with a market value of $2.07 trillion.
Only the Arab oil giant Saudi Aramco can break into the American phalanx in second place, which with 1.87 trillion dollars stands for the renaissance of oil and energy stocks in the shadow of the Ukraine war.
The German flagship SAP is still the most valuable company in the country at almost 121 billion dollars, but the software group has fallen to 106th place in the EY ranking. Germany’s number two is the Munich technology group Siemens, which has to be satisfied with 109 billion dollars and 116th place. Deutsche Telekom came in 130th, just under the $100 billion mark.
It is the only one of the eleven German companies among the world’s top 300 to have increased in value this year – by 14 percent. With a market value of almost 92 billion dollars, Porsche AG is the 145th best-placed newcomer worldwide. The sports car manufacturer has clearly outperformed the parent company Volkswagen, which has lost around 44 percent of its market value since the end of 2021.
The top German companies symbolize the long-term downward trend in Europe on the world stock exchanges. In 2007, 46 of the 100 most valuable stock market values came from the old continent and seven from Germany alone. In 2022, just 15 are from Europe – and none from Germany.
The number of companies from the USA and Canada in the ranking has almost doubled to 62 out of 32 in the same period. With Nestle (23rd place, 321 billion dollars), Roche (32nd place, 262 billion dollars) and Novartis (45th place, 196 billion dollars), three of the top 50 come from Switzerland.
“In view of the still significant importance of German companies for the global economy, Germany is clearly underrepresented on the world stock exchanges,” says EY Germany boss Henrik Ahlers. “But what counts on the stock exchanges is not the successes of the past, but future prospects.” Germany has so far failed to provide evidence of this.
“We are experiencing fundamental upheavals – although the rules are currently being made by American and Asian IT companies.” The impression is created that Europe is only watching from the sidelines. Many companies from Europe are in a deep restructuring, only a few young companies from the continent made it to the top of the world.
The fragmented capital market in Europe is also contributing to the backlog on the stock exchanges, says the EY boss. “Uniform capital market rules in Europe would be an important step.” By far the heaviest stock in the leading German index DAX, the gas group Linde, is about to withdraw from the Frankfurt Stock Exchange because it feels disadvantaged by the rules that apply there. The Irish-headquartered company has moved up to 59th out of 71 in the global stock exchange rankings with a market value of $162 billion this year.
The downturn on the stock exchanges has left its mark on the most expensive companies. The top 100 collectively lost $7.2 trillion in market value, or 20 percent of their total market capitalization.
The shares of leader Apple and number three, Microsoft, each lost 30 percent, Google’s parent company Alphabet (fourth place) was down 41 percent, and Amazon (fifth place) even lost half of its market value in the past twelve months .
The electric car manufacturer Tesla fell by two thirds from sixth to 20th place with a price drop, the Facebook operator Meta from seventh to 26th place.
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The original of this article “No German companies among the top hundred” comes from Deutsche Welle.
