FRANKFURT (dpa-AFX) - Some of the biggest stock market losers in 2022 are in demand among investors at the start of the new year. In the Dax, Vonovia and Zalando were now among the biggest winners, two shares that had recorded the highest share price losses in 2022, at around half their value. On Monday, Zalando was up 3.5 percent and Vonovia 2.6 percent, while the Dax was last up half a percent.

The real estate and retail sectors, in which the two Dax stocks are represented, were also in relatively strong demand across Europe. While the Dax most recently gained half a percent, the sector indices most recently gained 1.5 percent and 1.3 percent respectively.

In the MDax, price gains were particularly pronounced for Hellofresh, TAG Immobilien and Aroundtown, with increases of between 3.4 and 6.5 percent. In the SDax, Patrizia Immobilien and Shop Apotheke stood out positively with gains of more than four percent.

"On the trading floor, the start of the new year is associated with many hopes," said market observer Thomas Altmann of QC Partners in the morning. Investors are expecting a better stock market year in 2023 after last year, which the Dax ended with a discount of more than 12 percent, he said, adding that for the time being, investors are seeing greater opportunities in stocks that they had given most of their attention to until recently.

For some time now, market participants have been debating whether the strategy, which has so far focused more on intrinsic values, will continue to pay off - or whether growth stocks, such as those from the tech sector, are again promising in the new year. As in the real estate sector, future interest rate developments are considered the most important criterion here, as the inflation-driven interest rate spiral has driven up financing costs.

"However, it could be a long time before the market again receives absolution from central banks in the form of monetary easing signals," wrote Jochen Stanzl of broker CMC Markets in the morning. Decisive remains the view in the U.S., where in the coming days important economic data for the central bank Fed should be of importance. The hope that 2023 interest rate cuts will be possible again, had recently become smaller again.

In its annual outlook, the private bank Warburg expects the major central banks to raise their key interest rates further at the beginning of 2023, before the first interest rate cuts can be expected in 2024. The bank's experts therefore expect that intrinsic values will initially continue to outperform interest rate-sensitive growth stocks in the new year./tih/gl/mis