Varta, Enapter, NEL: Where hydrogen pays off directly

Varta: The "juice" is missing here

Varta is a specialist for button cells. All wearers of hearing aids also rely on the high-performance products made in Germany. But to become a hot story on the stock exchange, it is not enough to have convinced the 60+ generation. With its planned expansion into the field of batteries for electric cars, Varta has written a piece of stock market history. For about a year, the share has been in the focus of private investors. During this time, the share price has gone up and down. Recently, there was a little disillusionment. Doubts spread in the market as to whether Varta would withstand the competition from the Far East. Some analysts were also disillusioned and set price targets just above the EUR 100 mark.

Since then, the share has been hovering above EUR 110 - fantasy looks different. Although Varta is technologically convincing and, with its V4Drive high-performance battery, has a good chance of scoring points with manufacturers of electric cars, the share is not gaining momentum. On November 11, Varta will present figures for the first nine months. The Company could also provide an outlook then. After the value has multiplied since its IPO, it will not be easy to achieve new records. Varta's share currently lacks "juice."

Enapter: Making green hydrogen cheap

One stock that is holding relatively steady despite turbulent times is Enapter. The specialist in electrolyzers for the production of green hydrogen is on the verge of producing its solutions on a large scale. To this end, the Enapter campus is currently being built on 80,000 square meters in the climate community of Saerbeck. As early as the beginning of 2023, 10,000 electrolyzers are to be produced there every month. The technology behind this has been named a "Technology Pioneer 2021" by the World Economic Forum and promises low costs for green hydrogen thanks to its modular use.

While many competitors around renewable energy rely on support programs and subsidies, Enapter wants to be profitable right from the start. Nevertheless, Enapter also has political backing: the state of Rhineland-Palatinate, for example, is supporting the machinery for the planned mass production with EUR 9.36 million. Enapter's share price has quieted down in recent months but is showing relative strength compared with the rest of the industry. The innovative Company combines German engineering skills with visionary aspirations and thus fits in well with the spirit of the times.

NEL: Target just above EUR 1?

The NEL share is also an icon of the spirit of the times. When Germany was in lockdown for most of the period between fall 2020 and Easter 2021, many private investors envisioned a golden future. Hydrogen filling stations and other hydrogen-related products also played a key role. But as is so common with daydreams, they differed from reality in significant ways. In the case of NEL, the rather measly order volumes hardly matched the valuation - the share price multiplied between fall 2020 and spring 2021. Since then, NEL has been fighting the crash without success.

Most recently, the stock has for a long time struggled at the EUR 1.30 mark and has since lost this battle. The downside potential thus appears greater than the upside. Even on a one-year horizon, the share is now deeply in the red. The next possible support zone is the EUR 1.03 mark. Only orders with high volume could trigger a sustainable trend reversal at NEL.

While the air seems to be out at NEL and Varta, the Enapter share is holding comparatively stable. It could be because Enapter focuses on the low-cost production of green hydrogen instead of thinking about its distribution today. Although there is currently no buying panic around the share, these are good conditions for anti-cyclical investors to take a close look at the Company and the share.