The Market In 5 Minutes: Hello... Can You Hear Me?

Macro Focus

U.S. stock futures traded higher in early pre-market trade. Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 50 points to 20,273.00, while the Standard & Poor's 500 index futures rose 4.75 points to 2,317.50. Futures for the Nasdaq 100 index gained 8 points to 5,234.75.

Oil prices traded lower as Brent crude futures dropped 0.78 percent to trade at $56.26 per barrel, while US WTI crude futures fell 0.67 percent to trade at $53.50 a barrel.

The Treasury is set to auction 3-month bills at 11:30 a.m. ET.
The Treasury will also auction 6-month bills at 11:30 a.m. ET.

BZ News Desk Focus

Teva Pharma TEVA Q4 EPS $1.38 vs $1.35 Est, Revenue $6.49B vs $6.25B Est; Sees FY 2017 EPS $4.90 to $5.30 vs $4.83 Est, Revenue $23.8B to $24.5B vs $23.7B Est

The earnings season may be winding down, but it's not over yet. Perhaps two of the most anticipated quarterly reports this week will be those from Cisco Systems CSCO and PepsiCo PEP. Forecasts call for earnings that are smaller than a year ago from the networking products and services giant, which during the most recent quarter bought AppDynamics before its IPO. On the other hand, solid bottom-line growth is expected from the beverage and snack foods giant, relative to the year-ago period.

Sell-Side Themes

Goldman Sachs initiated coverage on Hasbro HAS at Buy and Mattel MAT at Neutral.

Sell-Side's Most Noteworthy Calls

Piper Jaffray upgraded Regeneron REGN to Overweight.
Morgan Stanley upgraded JC Penney JCP to Equal-Weight.
Tesley downgraded Williams-Sonoma WSM to Market Perform.
Morgan Stanley downgraded AK Steel AKS to Equal-Weight.

Deal Talk

Sanofi SNY agreed to sell some over-the-counter products to Ipsen SA as it edges closer to completing a 22.8 billion-euro ($24.2 billion) asset swap with Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH. Ipsen will pay 83 million euros for five products including Prontalgine, a painkiller. French drugmaker Ipsen said it expects to complete the purchase in the second quarter.

Walgreens WBA and Fred's FRED are said to be moving towards an agreement on a new divestiture package that they expected to provide to the Federal Trade Commission in the next 30 to 40 days, according to MLex Market Insight. Traders in February Rite Aid RAD calls also are betting on the deal being approved in the near future. On January 30, Walgreens lowered its offer for Rite Aid from $9.00 to a maximum of $7.00 per share.

In The News

President Trump will be having dinner with Las Vegas Sands LVS CEO Sheldon Adelson. Adelson was a major contributor to Trump’s campaign. Adelson and his wife donated a total of at least $21.2 million to Trump’s cause and are close personal friends with the president. Here’s a brief overview of some of the business topics that Trump and Adelson could cover.

Cannabis stocks had another great week, with the Viridian Cannabis Stock Index up for the eighth consecutive week. For the seven days ended February 3, the index gained 1.8 percent. While this surge represented a slowdown in relation to previous weeks, it still implied a marked outperformance in relation to major market indexes and ETFs like the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average.

Blogosphere

Getting Lucky & The Stock That Changed My Life: "When I finally graduated from Queens College in 2008, I jumped at the opportunity to work at a financial services (insurance) company in New York City. I felt fortunate that my screw-up hadn’t set me back."

Mike Ilitch, Founder of Little Caesars and the owner of the Detroit Red Wings and Tigers for decades, died at the age of 87 Friday night: "Mike Ilitch resurrected the 'Dead Wings,' gave the Tigers back their roar and turned a small pizza store into a global empire. But possibly the greatest legacy Ilitch leaves behind for the Motor City is downtown Detroit itself."

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