Porsche AG shares rise after investor call

FRANKFURT/LONDON (Reuters) -Shares in luxury carmaker Porsche AG rose 3.9% and were among the biggest gainers in Frankfurt's blue-chip DAX index on Wednesday after positive brokerage comments following a call with investors.

Porsche, which is majority owned by Volkswagen, held on Tuesday what is known as a pre-close call - a briefing for analysts before a quiet period pending quarterly results begins.

One trader said Porsche had sequential margin improvement and a better cash conversion for the second quarter, the latest sign that high-margin luxury cars offer some margin protection in the face of a weaker Chinese market.

Goldman Sachs, keeping a "buy" rating on the stock in a note following the call, said it expected "a more normalised quarter at 2Q, following a challenging 1Q when the company underwent the changeover of its Panamera and Taycan models and experienced some constraints on shipments into the US".

Stifel also said the second quarter operating margins should show a "clear improvement" over those in the first quarter and that the group during the call confirmed its 15-17% margin guidance for the full year.

Shares in Porsche AG, which was carved out from parent Volkswagen in 2022, have lost more than a fifth over the last three months, in part because of weakness in China, the group's most important market.

(Reporting by Anika Ross and Samuel Indyk; Writing by Christoph Steitz; Editing by Rachel More and Barbara Lewis)