BERLIN, Feb. 17 (Xinhua) -- German stocks were almost unchanged at the start of trading on Monday, with the benchmark DAX index down by 12.26 points, or 0.09 percent, opening at 13,756.47 points.
The biggest winner among Germany's 30 largest listed companies at the start of trading was automotive supplier Continental, increasing 2.08 percent, followed by carmakers Daimler and Volkswagen with 1.56 and 1.51 percent respectively.
Shares of Bayer dropped by 2.74 percent. The pharmaceutical company was the biggest loser at the start of trading on Monday.
On Friday after trading, a U.S. court in Missouri ordered Bayer to pay a plaintiff farmer a total of 265 million dollars because the herbicide Dicamba had destroyed his fruit crop. The sum was made up of 15 million U.S. dollars in compensation for damages and a 250 million-dollar fine.
Germany's manufacturing sector increased earnings by 0.7 percent to 24.3 billion euros (26.4 billion U.S. dollars) in December 2019 compared to the previous year, the German Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) announced on Monday. At the same time, the number of employees had decreased by 0.5 percent.
On Monday, Germany's central bank, Deutsche Bundesbank, is scheduled to present its monthly report, commenting on the economic situation in Germany at the change of the year.
The euro was trading unchanged at 1.0840 U.S. dollars on Monday morning.
