Following the market opening Thursday, the Dow traded down 0.39 percent to 25,852.94 while the NASDAQ declined 0.77 percent to
7,431.52. The S&P also rose, gaining 0.49 percent to 2,771.18.
Leading and Lagging Sectors
Thursday morning, the utilities shares rose 0.01 percent. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included PG&E
Corporation (NYSE: PCG) up 3 percent, and
Spark Energy Inc (NASDAQ: SPKE) up 1
percent.
In trading on Thursday, communication services shares fell 0.9 percent.
Top Headline
Domino's Pizza (NYSE: DPZ) reported
downbeat results for its fourth quarter.
Domino's Pizza said it earned $2.62 per share in the fourth quarter on revenue of $1.082 billion. However, analysts were
expecting earnings of $2.70 per share and revenue of $1.1 billion. U.S. same-store sales rose 5.6 percent, while international
same-store sales gained 2.4 percent.
Domino's Pizza raised its quarterly dividend by 18 percent to 65 cents a share.
Equities Trading UP
Immune Design Corp. (NASDAQ: IMDZ)
shares got a boost, shooting up 309 percent to $5.81 after Merck & Co., Inc. (NYSE: MRK) announced plans to acquire the company at $5.85 per share in cash or $300
million.
Shares of Career Education Corporation (NASDAQ: CECO) shot up 22 percent to $17.00 after reporting upbeat Q4 results.
Zosano Pharma Corporation (NASDAQ: ZSAN) shares were also up, gaining 20 percent to $2.64 after the company reported
completion of final milestone for the long-term study of Qtrypta for the acute treatment of migraine disease.
Equities Trading DOWN
Libbey Inc. (NYSE: LBY) shares dropped 34
percent to $3.78 after reporting Q4 results.
Shares of Carbon Black, Inc./b> (NASDAQ: CBLK) were down 23 percent to $12.74 after the company issued Q1 EPS and sales
guidance under analyst estimates. JP Morgan downgraded Carbon Black from Overweight to Neutral and lowered the price target from
$30 to $15.
ReWalk Robotics Ltd. (NASDAQ: RWLK) was down, falling around 18 percent to $0.2485 after the company announced a
4.4 million share stock offering priced at $0.23 per share.
Commodities
In commodity news, oil traded up 1.4 percent to $56.90 while gold traded down 0.7 percent to $1,338.80.
Silver traded down 1.6 percent Thursday to $16.02, while copper fell 0.6 percent to $2.903.
Eurozone
European shares were mixed today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 fell 0.2 percent, the Spanish Ibex Index rose 0.19 percent,
while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index declined 0.27 percent. Meanwhile the German DAX gained 0.25 percent, and the French CAC 40 rose 0.01
percent while U.K. shares fell 1 percent.
Economics
U.S. durable goods orders rose 1.2 percent in December, versus economists’ expectations for a 0.8 percent
increase.
Initial jobless claims dropped 23,000 to 216,000 in the latest week. However, economists were expecting a reading of
229,000.
The Philadelphia Fed manufacturing index declined to a reading of -4.1 in February, compared to 17 in the previous
month. However, economists were projecting a reading of 15.6.
The flash reading of the IHS Markit manufacturing PMI dropped to 53.7 in February, versus a reading of 54.9 in
January.
Existing-home sales fell 1.2 percent at an annual rate of 4.94 million in January.
The index of leading economic indicators declined 0.1 percent for February.
The Energy Information Administration’s weekly report on natural gas stocks in underground storage is schedule for
release at 10:30 a.m. ET.
The EIA’s weekly report on petroleum inventories will be released at 11:00 a.m. ET.
The Treasury is set to auction 4-and 8-week bills at 11:30 a.m. ET.
Data on money supply for the recent week will be released at 4:30 p.m. ET.
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