The DAX is a stock market index consisting of the 40 major German blue chip companies trading on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange. It is a total return index. Prices are taken from the Xetra trading venue. According to Deutsche Börse, the operator of Xetra, DAX measures the performance of the Prime Standard's 40 largest German companies in terms of order book volume and market capitalization. DAX is the equivalent of the UK FTSE 100 and the US Dow Jones Industrial Average, and because of its small company selection it does not necessarily represent the vitality of the German economy as a whole.
The MDAX is a stock index which lists German companies trading on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange. The index is calculated by Deutsche Börse.
The SDAX is a stock market index composed of 70 small and medium-sized companies in Germany. These so-called 'small caps' rank directly below the MDAX (mid-cap) shares in terms of order book volume and market capitalization. They are thus the 91st–160th largest publicly traded companies in Germany.
The Hypo Real Estate Holding AG is a holding company based in Munich, Germany which comprises a number of real estate financing banks. The company's activities span three sectors of the real estate market: commercial property, infrastructure and public finance, and capital markets and asset management. Hypo Real Estate is the second largest commercial property lender in Germany.
Deutsche EuroShop AG is an internationally active German real estate investment company headquartered in Hamburg. It is the largest German investor in shopping centers, and the country's only publicly traded company to do so exclusively. At the end of 2021, the firm held investments in 21 properties in Germany, Austria, Poland, Czech Republic and Hungary.
GSW Immobilien AG, formerly Gemeinnützige Siedlungs- und Wohnungsbaugesellschaft Berlin mbH, is a German real-estate company in Berlin. The company invests in residential property and also manages residential and commercial property on behalf of third parties.
Covivio, formerly Foncière des Régions, is a European investment and development company with business activities encompassing office real estate (46%), hotels (26%) and residential accommodation (26%). Europe's fourth-largest real estate investment trust (REIT), its portfolio is worth an estimated €23 billion. Two thirds of the portfolio is divided between Paris, Berlin and Milan, with an occupancy rate of 98.1%.
Starlight Investments is a privately-held Canadian real estate investment and asset management company based in Toronto, Ontario. As of 2021, Starlight owns 70,000 multi-family units, 8 million square feet of commercial space, and over 600 properties across Canada.
LEG Immobilien AG (Landesentwicklungsgesellschaft) is a German property company. As of 2016, it is a constituent of the MDAX trading index of German mid-cap companies.
Talanx is a German multinational financial services company headquartered in Hanover, Germany. Its core businesses are reinsurance, insurance and asset management. Talanx is Germany's third-largest and one of the major European insurance Groups by premium income. The Group is headquartered in Hannover, Germany and is active in more than 150 countries. The Talanx Group operates as a multi-brand provider with a focus on B2B insurance. As of 2016, it was a constituent of the MDAX trading index of German mid-cap companies. In September 2018 it was shifted from MDAX to SDAX.
Vonovia is a European multinational real estate company based in Bochum, North Rhine-Westphalia. Its history goes back to Deutsche Annington, which merged with GAGFAH and was subsequently renamed Vonovia. The company currently owns around 565,000 apartments in Germany, Sweden, and Austria, making it a significant market player in these countries. Vonovia is a member of the DAX 40 and STOXX Europe 600 blue-chip indexes.
Yakir Gabay is a Cypriot-Israeli billionaire real estate businessman, based in London. He owns 10% of Frankfurt-listed Luxembourgish real estate company Aroundtown SA.
Aroundtown SA is a publicly listed real estate company, registered in Luxembourg. It invests in commercial and residential properties in central locations in European cities primarily in Germany and the Netherlands.
Artur Stefan Kirsten is a German manager and honorary professor of economics at Westfälische Hochschule (Germany).
Rolf Eberhard Buch is a German business executive. In 2013, he was appointed CEO of the real estate company Deutsche Annington, which, following the takeover of GAGFAH in the year 2015, was renamed Vonovia. Previously, Buch held an executive position at Arvato.
Gewobag is a German property company owned by the State of Berlin which plans to own 80,000 apartments by 2030 in order to improve housing affordability.
Grand City Properties S.A. is a residential real estate company, headquartered in Luxembourg. It invests in value-add residential opportunities in the largest cities and metropolitan areas of Germany and London. With 63.000 apartments, Grand City Properties is one of the largest residential real estate companies in Europe.
The 2021 Berlin referendum, formally referred to as Deutsche Wohnen & Co. enteignen or DW enteignen, was a referendum held and passed in Berlin in 2021. Voters were asked if they approved of the expropriation of the property of private real-estate companies with 3,000 or more units in the city, through public purchases by the Berlin state government. This would affect 243,000 rental apartments out of 1.5 million total apartments in Berlin. The largest such real-estate company is Deutsche Wohnen, for which the initiative is named, followed by Vonovia. In total, the referendum would impact 12 large real-estate companies.
Scout24, based in Munich, is a listed digital company and operates the online marketplace ImmoScout24. The multi-platform of ImmoScout24 has more than 20 million visitors per month in Germany in 2021 on the website or in the app.
The state of Berlin has three instruments of direct democracy. These enable German citizen residents to directly influence policy, in addition to indirect democracy via elected officials in the House of Representatives. In addition, there are two instruments at the borough level.
