FRANKFURT (dpa-AFX) - In September, Lufthansa or FMC could challenge online fashion retailer Zalando for a place in the Dax. Whether everything will remain the same in the German stock market barometer or whether there will be a swap of places is currently hanging by a thread. The situation is hardly any different for the index of mid-caps, the MDax. In the SDax, which contains the smaller stocks below the MDax, there should u as of today - at least be a change. "However, in the SDax in particular, everything is very tight as usual," so the picture can also quickly look very different, according to index expert Luca Thorißen of investment bank Stifel Europe.

The next date for the scheduled review of the Dax index family by Deutsche Borse is Tuesday, September 5, after close of trading. Any changes will come into effect on Monday, September 18.

FMC could womoglich return to the Dax or offer a tussle with Lufthansa, which is also in the MDax. Because: the missing distance to the coveted 33rd place on the current ranking list of companies, which would allow admission after "Fast Entry", amounts to just 500 million euros in freely tradable borse value for the dialysis specialist. For Lufthansa, the shortfall is currently around 900 million euros. The benchmark here is currently chemicals trader Brenntag, which ranks 33rd out of 40 companies in the Dax with a market capitalization after free float of 9.8 billion euros. However, Brenntag is not the strike candidate.

"Should FMC or even Lufthansa succeed in increasing their share price accordingly above average, u as of today - Zalando as the smallest Dax stock would be the relegated candidate," Thorißen said. The free float-oriented stock market value for the fashion retailer is currently 6.9 billion euros. The second smallest value in the Dax is the automotive supplier and tire manufacturer Continental with 7.7 billion euros.

Meanwhile, the regular promotion and relegation rules of Deutsche Borse, which actually apply in September, would not help FMC and Lufthansa. While both are regular promotion candidates, this rule also requires regular relegation candidates, i.e. Dax companies that are no longer large enough to remain in the leading index. However, this is not the case.

The situation is similar in the MDax. Here, too, the wafer manufacturer Siltronic from the SDax is currently a regular candidate for promotion - and there is currently no regular candidate for relegation there either. The weakest stock at the moment is the TV group ProSiebenSat.1 with 1.16 billion euros in freely tradable boron value, followed by the recycling specialist Befesa with 1.2 billion euros. However, both are ranked slightly above 90th in the rankings, although they would have to drop to 103rd place to be relegated.

On the other hand, hydrogen specialist Nucera is likely to be admitted to the SDax in September, thus displacing Basler, a supplier of image processing components. Nucera was only listed in July by Thyssenkrupp, but has long been active in the hydrogen business and offers technology for electrolysis plants that use electricity to split water into oxygen and hydrogen. Regular admission candidates would also be United Internet subsidiary Ionos and online fashion retailer About You. But since there are currently no regular relegated companies, there should u as of today - be no further changes.

Such changes are particularly important for funds that replicate indices in real terms (physically replicating ETFs). There, rebalancing must then take place accordingly, which can have an impact on share prices./ck/jsl/mis