Mid-Afternoon Market Update: Dow Up 160 Points; Lantheus Shares Surge On Earnings Beat

 


Toward the end of trading Friday, the Dow traded up 0.87 percent to 18,511.69 while the NASDAQ climbed 1.02 percent to 5,218.84. The S&P also rose, gaining 0.71 percent to 2,179.59.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Friday afternoon, the financial sector proved to be a source of strength for the market. Leading the sector was strength from Ashford Hospitality Trust, Inc. AHT and NewStar Financial Inc NEWS.

In trading on Friday, utilities shares fell by 0.93 percent. Meanwhile, top losers in the sector included Sempra Energy SRE, down 3 percent, and CenterPoint Energy, Inc. CNP, down 3 percent.

Top Headline

Priceline Group Inc PCLN reported stronger-than-expected earnings for its second quarter on Thursday.

EPS of $13.93 came in well above the Street’s consensus of $12.69, while revenue of $2.56 billion missed estimates of $2.6 billion.

Equities Trading UP

Freshpet Inc FRPT shares shot up 25 percent to $10.36. Freshpet reported a Q2 loss of $0.10 per share on revenue of $33 million.

Shares of Lantheus Holdings Inc LNTH got a boost, shooting up 50 percent to $5.84 as the company reported strong Q2 results.

PTC Therapeutics, Inc. PTCT shares were also up, gaining 27 percent to $7.73 as the company posted a narrower-than-expected Q2 loss.


Equities Trading DOWN

Hortonworks Inc HDP shares dropped 23 percent to $9.77 after the company reported a wider-than-expected loss for the second quarter.

Shares of Computer Programs & Systems, Inc. CPSI were down 31 percent to $27.00 after the company posted weaker-than-expected Q2 results.

Sierra Wireless, Inc. (USA) SWIR was down, falling around 17 percent to $14.32. Sierra Wireless posted better-than-expected quarterly earnings, but issued a weak outlook.


Commodities


In commodity news, oil traded down 0.67 percent to $41.65 while gold traded down 1.76 percent to $1,343.40.

Silver traded down 3.27 percent Friday to $19.78, while copper fell 0.64 percent to $2.16.

Eurozone

European shares closed higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 rose 1.05 percent, the Spanish Ibex Index rose 1.84 percent, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index gained 2.4 percent. Meanwhile the German DAX rose 1.36 percent, and the French CAC 40 gained 1.49 percent, while U.K. shares rose 0.79 percent.

Economics

The U.S. economy added 255,000 new jobs in July, versus economists’ estimates for an addition of 180,000 jobs. The unemployment rate remained unchanged 4.9 percent in the month.

The U.S. trade deficit widened 8.7 percent to $44.5 billion in June. However, economists were projecting the trade gap to increase to $43.2 billion in the month. U.S. imports rose 1.9 percent to $227.7 billion in June, while exports rose 0.3 percent to $183.2 billion.

The Baker Hughes North American rig count for the latest week is schedule for release at 1:00 p.m. ET.

Data on consumer credit for June will be released at 3:00 p.m. ET.

Date
ticker
name
Actual EPS
EPS Surprise
Actual Rev
Rev Surprise
Posted In: EarningsNewsEurozoneCommoditiesGlobalIntraday UpdateMarketsMoversMid-Afternoon Market Update
Benzinga simplifies the market for smarter investing

Trade confidently with insights and alerts from analyst ratings, free reports and breaking news that affects the stocks you care about.

Join Now: Free!

Loading...