Hornbach FY Preliminary Adj. EBIT Up 11%

Hornbach Holding AG & Co. KGaA reported that preliminary adjusted EBIT for fiscal year 2021/22 rose about 11% to about 364 million euros which is within the guided range of 330 million euros to 380 million euros.

The company expects net sales in the fiscal year 2021/22 to have increased by 7.7% to 5.875 billion euros. This is slightly above the range of +2% to +7% communicated in the guidance update on December 7, 2021.

The strong sales growth was driven by continued high demand for home improvement products as well as increasing inflation which affected purchasing and selling prices, the company said.

Gold Futures Settle Slightly Higher

Gold prices edged higher on Monday, recovering from day’s lows, as lingering concerns about Russia-Ukraine war contributed a bit to boost the demand for the safe-haven commodity.

A stronger dollar limited gold’s gains. The dollar index climbed to 98.47, gaining about 0.25%.

Prices drifted lower earlier in the session after comments from the Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell about inflation suggested the central bank might hike interest rate by more than 25 basis points at least once this year.

Gold futures for April ended higher by $0.20 at $1,929.50 an ounce.

Silver futures for May ended up by $0.226 at $25.313 an ounce, while Copper futures for May settled at $4.7105 per pound, down $0.0290 from the previous close.

“We will take the necessary steps to ensure a return to price stability,” Powell said in remarks to the National Association for Business Economics. “In particular, if we conclude that it is appropriate to move more aggressively by raising the federal funds rate by more than 25 basis points at a meeting or meetings, we will do so.”

He added, “And if we determine that we need to tighten beyond common measures of neutral and into a more restrictive stance, we will do that as well.”

The comments from Powell come after the Fed raised interest rates by 25 basis points last week and signaled more rate hikes are likely in the coming months.

Atlanta Federal Reserve Bank President Raphael Bostic said on Monday he was open to a more aggressive policy tightening, while pencilling in six rate hikes for 2022.

Apple slammed by service outage

FOX Business Flash top headlines for March 21

Here are your FOX Business Flash top headlines for March 21.

Apple on Monday experienced an outage across several of its products. 

US CHARGES FORMER APPLE BUYER WITH DEFRAUDING MORE THAN $10 MILLION FROM COMPANY

According to the tech giant's System Status page, the outages started around 12:30 p.m. 

Impacted services as of the time of publication include the App Store, Apple Arcade, Apple Music, Apple Podcasts, Apple Radio, Apple Fitness+, Apple Business Manager, Apple School Manager, Apple Maps, iMessage, iCloud, AppleTV+, the iTunes Store and Find My. Several services are also down for Apple's developers, according to a separate status page. 

Thousands of Apple users have reported experiencing service interruptions across the services, according to tracking by DownDetector. 

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Apple, which is investigating the issue, did not disclose the cause of the outage. It warned that services may be slow or unavailable while the outage is being resolved.

A representative for the company did not immediately return FOX Business' request for comment.  

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

European Economics Preview: UK Unemployment Data Due

Unemployment from the UK and economic confidence from Germany are due on Tuesday, headlining a busy day for the European economic news.

At 3.00 am ET, the Office for National Statistics is scheduled to issue UK unemployment data for December. The ILO jobless rate is forecast to fall to 4.0 percent in three months to January from 4.1 percent in the preceding period.

At 3.30 am ET, producer and import prices data for February is due from Switzerland. Prices had increased 5.4 percent on a yearly basis in January.

At 3.45 am ET, France’s statistical office is scheduled to issue final consumer and harmonized prices for February. Consumer price inflation is seen rising to 3.6 percent, as initially estimated, from 2.9 percent in January.

At 4.00 am ET, consumer prices from Slovakia and producer prices from the Czech Republic are due.

At 6.00 am ET, Germany ZEW economic confidence survey results are due. The economic sentiment index is forecast to fall to 10.0 in March from 54.3 in the previous month.

In the meantime, Eurostat is scheduled to issue Euro area industrial production for January. Production is expected to rise 0.1 percent on month, slower than the 1.2 percent increase in December.

There’s Nothing Like a Good Concha. Here’s How to Make Them Great.

The popular Mexican sweet bread, with its seashell-shaped topping, is a delight when prepared right.

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By Pati Jinich