The Point for Europe Friday, 21 August 2026

The Point for Europe Friday, 21 August 2026

Top Call | Company | Industry | Strategy & Economics | Fixed Income & FX | Key Rating and Target Price Changes

Top Call Must Read ThyssenKrupp AG (TKAG.DE) - (Still) Catalyst Rich, Cash Rich, Steel Value Global Economic Outlook & Strategy - Catchup – TP to €20 Renewed Uncertainties—But There are 5 big catalysts which could drive a step change to the TK investment Continued Resilience case in our view – TK Accelis spin (’26), Monetization of elevator stake, spin of majority stake in steel, spin/sale of automotive tech, and spin of decarb technologies. The upside could be brought forward through special dividends as well. Most of the c.550% upside from the share price trough in Sep’24 can be explained by the re-rating of the value embedded in marine system, which means that the TK ex-marine ‘stub’ has significant upside to peers, especially in steel. Increase TP to €20, our SoTP is €24. Ephrem Ravi | Krishan M Agarwal

Wacker Chemie AG (WCHG.DE) - Poly uncertainty continues to weigh Despite a favourable Section 232 outcome giving Wacker’s solar polysilicon business a viable lifeline, tangible evidence of a recovery will likely take time. Meanwhile, major uncertainties persist, including Elon Musk’s US solar plans. Q2 Polysilicon earnings surprised to the downside, contributing to our new 2027 group EBITDA forecast being 3% below consensus. While greater scepticism on the outlook thus appears warranted, the shares still discount no-growth EBITDA materially above mid-cycle, making Wacker the most expensive Diversified chemical stock. With downside risk to consensus and relatively demanding valuation, we maintain our Sell rating with a new target price of €85, down from €95 on lower forecasts. Sebastian Satz, CFA | Ranulf Orr, CFA | Omi Pallavi

Company Fresenius SE & Co KGaA (FREn.DE) - FRE’s sale of c.3% FMC stake an important signal for future; Buy On Aug. 20 after close, FRE announced the sale of 7.8mn FMC shares worth c.Eur300mn, implying a LSD to MSD discount to FMC’s price at close. Following this transaction, FRE now holds c.25% of FMC (down from c.28% previously). FRE remains subject to a lock-up on its remaining shares of up to 45 days, and the company noted that it will manage its remaining holding over time subject to market conditions, capital allocation priorities, and lock-up. We see this _ transaction as a positive as it reduces FRE’s earnings and share price sensitivity to _

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FMC. More importantly, we see this as signaling more clearly FRE’s intention to over time meaningfully reduce its ownership of FMC. We are Buy-rated on FRE, and Neutral-rated on FMC. Veronika Dubajova | Giang H Nguyen, CFA | Harry Shrives Ph.D., CFA

Amplifon SpA (AMPF.MI) - GN Hearing underwhelming 2Q26 org. growth could weigh on sentiment; we remain Buy-rated On Aug. 19 after market close, GN Store Nord (GN) pre-announced 2Q26 Hearing org. growth of -2%, impacted by 'challenging revenue development' in a major US key account. This compares with Demant reporting wholesale growth of c.10%; on a 2-year stack, GN Hearing +2.9% in 2Q26 vs. Demant wholesale +4.7%. We think this announcement could weigh on Amplifon's shares today, which we would see as creating a potential buying opportunity: 1) GN’s performance has no bearing on Amplifon's 2026 guidance as the deal is not expected to close until YE-26; 2) GN is launching ReSound Sensia from Aug. 20 across RIEs and ITEs, which includes features that resonated well with audiologists as seen with Vivia; this should support improving growth into 2027; 3) our forecasts already assume c.6-7% dis- synergies (vs. c.1-5% in prior deals), and as such, more than allow for a disappointing quarter at GN. We rate Amplifon Buy. Veronika Dubajova | Giang H Nguyen, CFA | Harry Shrives Ph.D., CFA

Industry Europe Leisure and Lodging - RevPAR: Launching new granular RevPAR tracker. US domestic demand, UK Barclaycards’ data. w/c 8th Aug: RevPAR sequentially +4.3ppts for UK (to +4.1%) and +3.1ppts for UK Economy (+0.4%). For Germany, RevPAR was up 4.6ppts WoW to 4.2% while Spain was…