1/29 Friday Stock Market Movers & News Good Morning Stonk Forums! Happy Friday! 5 things to know before the stock market opens Friday 1. Dow futures extend losses as Wall Street’s volatile week continues The Dow Jones Industrial Average was set to drop 300 points at Friday’s open, extending losses with Dow stock Johnson & Johnson falling after the U.S. drug giant released data about its one-dose coronavirus vaccine. The shot was 72% effective in the U.S., but less so in other regions. Wall Street has seen a volatile week, also marked by the Reddit-fueled frenzy around GameStop and other highly shorted stocks. The Dow Thursday recovered nearly half of Wednesday’s 633-point decline, the worst one-session drop since late October. Ahead of Friday’s trading, the Dow was nearly 2% away from its closing record high earlier this month. Three Dow stocks — Caterpillar, Honeywell and Chevron — reported quarterly earnings before-the-bell, along with drugmaker Eli Lilly. 2. J&J says vaccine less effective against some Covid variants J&J’s highly anticipated vaccine results were based on 468 confirmed Covid-19 cases among the phase three trial’s more than 43,000 volunteers, including those infected with the new, highly contagious strain found in South Africa. J&J also said the vaccine was 85% effective in preventing severe disease four weeks after vaccination in all adults. If the J&J vaccine gets cleared by the FDA, it would be the third approved for emergency use in the U.S., behind the Pfizer and BioNTech vaccine and Moderna’s, both of which are two doses. U.S.-based biotech firm Novavax said late Thursday that its coronavirus vaccine was more than 89% effective in protecting against Covid-19. In its phase three clinical trial conducted in Britain, the two-shot vaccine appeared to be 85.6% effective against the new strain originally found in the U.K. However, a phase two study in South African, the Novavax was only 49.4% effective against the new variant found in that country. Shares of Novavax surged nearly 60% in Friday’s premarket. 3. Robinhood raises $1 billion, taps credit lines to facilitate GameStop trading Robinhood raised $1 billion overnight from investors to shore up its balance sheet as the brokerage app was set to ease restrictions in the trading of certain volatile stocks, according to CNBC’s Andrew Ross Sorkin. The money raised was on top of the $500 million the broker accessed through credit lines to ensure it had the capital required to keep allowing its clients to trade stocks like GameStop and AMC Entertainment. Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev told CNBC tapping the credit lines was a proactive measure and denied it was because of a liquidity issue. After stumbling a day earlier, GameStop and AMC Entertainment shares surged 80% and 50% in Friday’s premarket, respectively. 4. Elon Musk’s tweets about cryptocurrencies spark rallies Robinhood restricted trading in cryptocurrencies Friday as the price of bitcoin and a meme-inspired token rose sharply after Elon Musk tweets. Bitcoin skyrocketed as much as 20% early Friday to about $38,100 after Musk added #bitcoin to his Twitter bio. The Tesla CEO also sent out a cryptic tweet: “In retrospect, it was inevitable.” The world’s most valuable cryptocurrency hit an all-time high of $41,940 earlier this month before sinking sharply a week later. Dogecoin, originally founded as a joke about a dog meme, soared as much as 800% on Thursday after a Reddit board talked about making it the cryptocurrency equivalent of GameStop. Musk tweeted out Thursday evening a picture of a magazine cover of “Dogue,” play on popular fashion title “Vogue.” 5. Democrats reject GOP attempts to break up Biden relief measure Democrats on Capitol Hill and the White House rejected a Republican pitch to split President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion coronavirus rescue plan into smaller chunks. Democrats appeared ready to push the measure through without GOP help. Success would give Biden a signature accomplishment in his first 100 days in office, unleashing money to expand vaccinations and reopen schools, send $1,400 direct payments to households, and other priorities, including a gradual increase in the federal minimum wage to $15 per hour. Failure would be a high-profile setback early in his presidency. STOCK FUTURES NOW: YESTERDAY'S MARKET HEAT MAP: YESTERDAY'S S&P SECTORS: TODAY'S ECONOMIC CALENDAR: NEXT WEEK'S ECONOMIC CALENDAR: MOST ACTIVE TRENDING DISCUSSIONS (STOCK SYMBOLS ARE CLICKABLE!): DOGE.X NVAX SLV NOK SRNE VXRT GME LKNCY JNJ AMC NEXT WEEK'S EARNINGS CALENDAR: () N/A. NEXT WEEK'S IPO'S: THIS MORNING'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS RELEASES: ($CAT $LLY $SAP $ERIC $CVX $HON $CL $WY $LHX $CHTR $PSX $SYF $BAH $GNTX $BMI $CHD $RDY $ROP $JCI $FBP $LYB $AMTD $DSKE $CPLP $BSVN $PFS $ROLL $WETF $TWIN $MOG.A $ESXB) BEFORE TODAY'S MARKET OPEN: AFTER TODAY'S MARKET CLOSE: NONE. YESTERDAY'S ANALYST UPGRADES/DOWNGRADES: YESTERDAY'S INSIDER TRADING FILINGS: TODAY'S DIVIDEND CALENDAR: THIS MORNING'S PRE-MARKET STOCK NEWS MOVERS: source: cnbc.com Biogen (BIIB) – The drugmaker’s shares jumped nearly 12% premarket on news that the Food and Drug Administration has extended the review period by three months for its experimental Alzheimer’s treatment aducanumab. Biogen is providing additional data to the FDA as part of the agency’s review. Skyworks Solutions (SWKS) – Skyworks spiked 13% in premarket trading, following a sizeable earnings beat. The mobile phone chip maker earned $3.36 per share for its latest quarter, well above the $2.08 a share consensus estimate. Revenue came in above estimates as well and Skyworks issued an upbeat current-quarter forecast. Novavax (NVAX) – The biotech company’s shares surged more than 40% in premarket trading, following news that its Covid-19 vaccine candidate had an 89.3% efficacy rate in a U.K. trial. Novavax note, however, that this represents interim data and that it would be two to three months before the company is ready to apply for authorization. Caterpillar (CAT) – The heavy equipment maker earned $2.12 per share for the fourth quarter, above the consensus estimate of $1.49 a share. Revenue essentially came in line with forecasts. The company said it was well-positioned for the future and should emerge from the pandemic stronger than it was before. Eli Lilly (LLY) – The drugmaker beat estimates by 40 cents a share, with quarterly earnings of $2.75 per share. Revenue also beat Street projections, boosted by strong sales of its diabetes drugs as well as the launch of its Covid-19 antibody treatment. Shares of Lilly rose 1.8% in premarket trading as of 7:45 a.m. ET. Honeywell (HON) – The industrial conglomerate earned $2.07 per share for the fourth quarter, 7 cents a share above estimates, with a beat for revenue as well. Honeywell said 2020 was a challenging year but noted that sequential improvements in profit and sales continued during the final three months of 2020. Chevron (CVX) – Chevron lost a penny a share for the fourth quarter, compared to consensus estimates of a 7 cents per share profit. Revenue was also below analysts’ forecasts, and the company’s overall results were hurt by low margins on fuel and acquisition costs among other factors. Chevron shares fell 2% in the premarket. Colgate-Palmolive (CL) – The consumer products company came in a penny a share ahead of estimates, with quarterly earnings of 77 cents per share. Revenue also topped Wall Street forecasts. Colgate said it sees 2021 organic sales up 3% to 5%, in line with its long-term target. Visa (V) – Visa beat estimates by 14 cents a share, with quarterly earnings of $1.42 per share. The payment network operator’s revenue also topped Wall Street forecasts. Visa benefited from a surge in online shopping during the holiday period, with overall payment volume up 5%. The company also announced an $8 billion stock buyback. Mondelez (MDLZ) – Mondelez came in a penny a share ahead of Street forecasts, with quarterly profit of 67 cents per share. The maker of Oreos and other snack foods reported better-than-expected revenue as well. Stay-at-home consumers continued to increase snack consumption. The company’s shares fell 2.2% in the premarket. Western Digital (WDC) – Western Digital reported quarterly earnings of 69 cents per share, 15 cents a share ahead of consensus. The hard disk drive maker’s revenue also beat forecasts. Western Digital has seen increased demand for storage devices and solutions during the pandemic. The company’s shares jumped 10% in premarket trading. U.S. Steel (X) – U.S. Steel lost 27 cents per share for its latest quarter, smaller than 68 cents a share loss that analysts were anticipating. The steel maker’s revenue was essentially in line with forecasts. Overall steel industry demand and pricing have improved, with U.S. Steel seeing average prices for flat-rolled steel increase by 4.6 percent from a year earlier. The company’s shares rose 6% in the premarket. AMC Entertainment (AMC) – AMC is exploring raising more capital, including a potential stock sale, according to a Reuters report. The movie theater chain’s stock is among those that have seen a surge from Reddit-inspired traders, along with stocks like GameStop (GME) and Bed Bath & Beyond (BBBY). Qualtrics (XM) – Qualtrics remains on watch after jumping 38 percent in its debut session Thursday. Qualtrics is an enterprise software company spun off by German software giant SAP (SAP). Have a happy trading day to everyone in here on this Friday!
