FRANKFURT (dpa-AFX) - The Dax extended its moderate gains of the previous day at the start of Wednesday's trading ahead of the Fed's interest rate decision. The price chart recently showed an increase of 0.75 percent to 18,549.51 points. The MDax of medium-sized companies rose by 0.67 percent to 25,475.98 points. The leading eurozone index EuroStoxx 50 gained 1.2 percent.

Numerous quarterly reports initially moved share prices on Wednesday, in some cases significantly. The results of the Fed meeting will not be on the agenda until after the close of trading here in Germany. A rate cut is not expected at this stage, but market participants are expecting one in September.

A small indication of the Fed's increasing willingness to ease monetary policy would already be a gain, wrote analyst Jochen Stanzl from broker CMC Markets. According to the expert, this would increase the chance that the European Central Bank (ECB) will turn the interest rate screw again in September. "Germany's economy is shrinking and this underlines what many are already saying behind closed doors: that the ECB's only interest rate cut to date has been far too little to have a real effect."/ajx