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The Stock Movers Report, your roundup of companies making moves in the stock market, harnessing the power of Bloomberg Data.
Well, let's take a look at some stocks on the move today in Europe. I'm Stephen Carroll with Caroline Hepger and we're joined by Bloomberg reporter Chloe Melee.
Chloe, good morning.
Let's start with some m and a news in the European banking sector. UniCredit making a bid for commerce Bank.
Yeah, this UniCredit Commas Bank saga that started in late twenty twenty four had gone a little bit quiet recently, but now it's very much back. So UniCredit, as you said, has made a thirty five billion euro takeover bid for Commas Bank, although it is not expected that it would gain full control, but essentially just push that stake above thirty percent. And as we remember, it is not the first time that UniCredit has tried to get that deal
done with Commos Bank. The CEO at first disclosed the stake in the bank in twenty twenty four, and then he went on to expand that stake more and more. But throughout this entire time, the German government has been really opposed to a takeover by UniCredit and has made it very clear. And since then, the commers Bank share price has risen a little bit more strongly than UniCredit, which is making a bit more expensive. But since the beginning of this year of twenty twenty six, commers Bank
has struggled a little bit more. It's one of the worst performers in that European banking sector and that might have led to UniCredit to try and pounce once again. Right now, UniCredit shares are down at a little bit. Of commerce Bank shares rose also actually quite a bit on the back of that deal, but we'll just have to wait and see if this happens this time.
Yeah, okay, so that on the UniCredit commas Bank deal, I mean it, it's sort of notable, isn't it. At a time as such flux in markets that you're seeing potentially a major banking m and a bit of activity. There's also some buzz about another merger acquisition Amplify.
Yeah, yeah, there's been. It's actually been quite a busy m and a day this morning. So it's a similar dynamic here with Amplophon and gin Store Nord, which where we see the shares in the target rising and then shares in the acquirer falling, though here the movements are actually even wilder. So gin Store Nord shares a surge more than forty percent, which was actually the most on record, after it had agreed to sell its hearing aid business to Ampliphon, and that is a deal that is valued
at about two point six billion a dollar. So that deal will make Amplifon a much larger competitor in that hearing aid business, which is an area that where a lot of bigger players are trying to get into it, so Eslo Luxotica for example. But the Ampliphon stock actually felt quite a lot on the back of this announcement, and some of it it might have to do with
the costs related to the acquisition. So it estimates integration costs of around eighty million euros in the next two to three years, and that might have been actually the focus for investors explaining of that weakness in the shares this morning.
Yeah, indeed, shows down over six percent today. And let's bring you then to the defense sector next and handsold. What's the news from them this morning.
Yeah, there's a couple of things Driving handsold this morning, so it was raised to a hold rating by KEPRA Shover analysts. There's also a cooperation agreement between Hensolt and Ammovio to open up career opportunities for Amovia employees, so essentially kind of creating a pipeline for employees in the auto industry, which has been, as we know, quite struggling quite a bit, to transition into the defense industry where there's definitely a lot more demand and a lot more activity.
And then it's also a handsol is also benefiting from that broader defense trade of course, which has obviously been very relevant over the last few weeks as the conflict in the Middle East shows really no sign of abating. So we've seen other names in that sector also in the green this morning, including Ryan Mettal and Rent Group. And you know, we've entered the third week now of
that conflict. There's really no clarity on win. Trump will be ready to call the end of it, given he's the person in the best position really to stop that conflict, to bring it to an end. But in the in meanwhile, the defense is really benefiting from this given the expectation that they will need to be more military spending, more defense spending in the geopolitical environment that is so tense at the moment.
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