Market sentiment: “Upward momentum”

1 October 2025. FRANKFURT (Goldberg & Goldberg). Last night showed once again that stock market traders are hardly influenced by political events in the US. For example, the government shutdown, which came into effect last night and involves the partial closure of the administrative apparatus, has so far had no significant impact on the stock markets on either side of the Atlantic. Even if there are fears that important economic data, such as that on the US labor market, may only be published with a delay.

In Germany, however, the impression is that market participants are trying to push the DAX up with all their might. Although several attempts to sustainably break through the important level of 23,800/850 DAX points had failed by the time the sentiment survey was conducted today, the resulting setbacks remained manageable. At the end of the sentiment week, the index is up 0.6 percent, and the trading range of 2.1 percent is pretty much the same as last week.

Without institutional investors

Unfortunately, a technical defect has meant that no results are available today for the institutional investors with a medium-term trading horizon whom we survey every week.

At least we have meaningful figures for private investors. In this panel, our Frankfurt Stock Exchange Sentiment Index rose again by 3 points to a new level of +16. While the mood among the investors we survey via social media has improved once again compared to the previous week, we find only a minimal change among the remaining private investors, albeit in the opposite direction. In this subgroup, the bear camp has increased by one percentage point at the expense of previously neutral investors, presumably because they did not believe the DAX would break through to the upside.

Wings needed for takeoff

In our opinion, this slight change among private investors who were not surveyed via social media could also reflect the behavior of professionals. At least in the recent past, similar developments have been observed repeatedly among these two investor groups. The Frankfurt Stock Exchange Sentiment Index for private investors who are not surveyed via social media is now at +3, which is neutral in relative terms when viewed over three and six months.

Ultimately, it should be noted that, particularly in recent days, supply has repeatedly come into play on the upside of the DAX – presumably the resulting positions have been repeatedly closed out – thus preventing a decisive breakthrough so far. At the very least, it can be said with some certainty that the slight increase in the DAX compared to the previous week is likely to be home-grown, while long-term forces, such as capital inflows and outflows from abroad, are likely to have played only a minor role in the DAX's performance. However, these capital flows would be necessary to give the DAX truly sustainable wings. Especially since the positions in this country are unlikely to be large enough to trigger a short squeeze.

By Joachim Goldberg

1 October 2025, © Goldberg & Goldberg für boerse-frankfurt.de

The Frankfurt Stock Exchange Sentiment Index ranges between -100 (total pessimism) and +100 (total optimism), with the transition from positive to negative values marking the neutral line. 

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