Two French Companies Bid Farewell to the STOXX Europe 600 Index
Stoxx Ltd, a subsidiary of the stock exchange operator Deutsche Börse, announced Monday the new composition of its flagship index, the STOXX Europe 600, which brings together the 600 leading listed companies on the continent.
As part of this review, two French companies are being removed: Alten, the European leader in engineering and advanced technology consulting, and Eurazeo, an investment company.
No other French company will be joining the index. On March 23, at market open, these firms will make way for other advancing European companies, notably Pan African Resources and Aixtron.
These decisions result from the criteria applied by Stoxx Ltd: free float market capitalization, lack of liquidity, and sector allocation.
Sharp Stock Market Declines for Alten and Eurazeo
Alten's 2025 annual accounts, published last month, showed a significant drop. This underperformance is linked to difficulties in the automotive sector, with ongoing short-term uncertainty. The company has experienced marked volatility, with its share price falling by nearly 30% over the past year.
Eurazeo, for its part, will present last year's results on March 11. However, its stock has plunged by 38% in a year. At the same time, strong competition from international private equity players has impacted its weight in the index.
Overall, this revision allows for a renewed focus on Europe's mining, industrial technology, and banking stocks.
The announcement prompted a mixed reaction during Monday's session. Alten's share price dropped 4.80%. Eurazeo, already under pressure in recent months, also fell by 4.50%.
Conversely, the soon-to-be-added stocks enjoyed renewed interest. Aixtron, in particular, has seen its share price soar by more than 73% since January 1.
ALTEN is European's No. 1 high-technology consulting and engineering group. The group's services are supplied to technical departments and IT system departments at large industrial, telecom, and utility companies. The activity is organized into 3 areas:
- technology engineering and consulting services: studies, design, and execution of research and development projects for new products/systems, consulting services, project management assistance, etc.;
- development of network architectures: design of terminals and network equipment, deployment and operation of networks;
- development of information systems: implementation or redesign of information systems and development of specific applications.
Net sales break down by market into automotive (18.1%), trade/services/media/public sector (17.5%), aeronautics and space (15.7%), industries (9.4%), banking/finance/insurance (8.4%), life sciences (8%), defense/security/maritime (7.7%), energy (7.6%), telecoms (4.9%), and rail (2.7%).
Net sales are distributed geographically as follows: France (32.8%), North America (11.7%), Spain (9.9%), Asia/Pacific (8.5%), Italy (8.2%), Germany (7.7%), the United Kingdom (6.9%), Benelux (5.4%), Scandinavia (3.9%), Eastern Europe (3.2%), Switzerland (1.3%) and other (0.5%).
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