Struggling battery manufacturer Varta had, after a true series of downward revisions to its forecasts, announced towards the end of last week that it hoped for a revival of its activities in the coming year. Then sales should again reach at least 900 million euros. Compared to the expected 820 million euros for 2023, this would be an increase of around 10 percent. According to the company, drivers of sales growth are energy storage systems and a recovery in lithium-ion products, which have been disappointing of late.

Stock in the Upward Trend Delighted investors then reacted and pushed the Varta share up 5 percent to 21.67 euros in the weekly trading. This puts the paper in the stock market no man’s land: far away from the lows from June with 14 euros, as well as from the twelve-month highs from last November, when the share was still quoted at 34 euros.

Trigger for optimism were good quarterly results. Thus, sales in the third quarter were around 215 million euros, the adjusted EBITDA was given with 29.4 million euros. In terms of sales, this corresponds to an increase of around 10 percent compared to the previous year, and with these results, Varta has once again returned to the black, after slight losses were recorded in the previous year.

Management mistakes This of course brings us to the question of what the trigger for the weak figures of last year was. The battery manufacturer actually got into the wrong position due to management mistakes and wrong market assessments. In particular, the demand for small button cells for wireless headsets was completely overestimated by the executive board of the company based in Ellwangen in eastern Baden-Württemberg.

You will now be asking yourself whether everything is now alright. I would still be skeptical about that. Because on the one hand the competition is still there, and on the other hand, the demand in consumer electronics is still declining.

Still Skeptical I would therefore warn you against any hasty purchase decisions. This is also how the spokesman Markus Hackstein sees it, if you read between the lines. At least I interpret the statement that behind Varta is a „challenging time“ and in front of Varta is „still a lot of work“ that way.