Mid-Afternoon Market Update: Crude Oil Up 1.5%; Alnylam Pharma Shares Tumble On Revusiran Termination

Toward the end of trading Thursday, the Dow traded down 0.05 percent to 18,271.28 while the NASDAQ declined 0.11 percent to 5,310.15. However, the S&P 500 gained 0.10 percent to 2,161.89.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Thursday afternoon, energy shares gained by 0.67 percent. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Daqo New Energy Corp DQ, and Ferrellgas Partners, L.P. FGP.

In trading on Thursday, healthcare shares tumbled by 0.77 percent. Meanwhile, top losers in the sector included Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc. ALNY, down 48 percent, and Idera Pharmaceuticals Inc IDRA, down 15 percent.

Top Headline

On Wednesday, Yum! Brands, Inc. YUM reported in-line earnings for its third quarter, but revenue missed estimates.

While EPS of $1.09 were in-line with the Street’s consensus, revenue of $3.32 billion missed estimates by $200 million.

Equities Trading UP

Aurinia Pharmaceuticals Inc AUPH shares shot up 26 percent to $5.11 after the company data from a 24-week clinical study called AURION, short for "Aurinia Early Urinary Protein Reduction Predicts Response Study." The open-label exploratory study consisted of 10 patients suffering from active lupus nephritisand and assessed the short-term predictors of response using the company's voclosporin (in a 23.7mg dose) in combination with mycophenolate mofetil (MMF) and oral corticosteroids. The study found that 70 percent of the patients achieved complete remission at 24 weeks.

Shares of Coupa Software Inc COUP got a boost, shooting up 92 percent to $34.59 in market debut. Coupa Software priced its IPO of 7.4 million shares at $18 per share.

Georgetown Bancorp Inc (MD) GTWN shares were also up, gaining 25 percent to $25.45 after Salem Five Bancorp agreed to acquire Georgetown Bancorp in an all cash transaction valued at around $49.2 million.

Equities Trading DOWN

Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc. ALNY shares dropped 48 percent to $36.88 after the company announced the discontinuation of the development of its late stage pipeline drug, Revusiran due to safety concerns. Leerink Swann downgraded Alnylam Pharmaceuticals from Outperform to Market Perform and lowered the price target from $107.00 to $40.00, while Barclays also downgraded the stock from Overweight to Equal-weight and lowered the price target from $85.00 to $50.00.

Shares of Inventergy Global Inc INVT were down 34 percent to $0.823. Inventergy priced its 6 million share offering at $1 per share.

Twitter Inc TWTR was down, falling around 19 percent to $20.05 after Recode reported that Google GOOGL, Apple Inc. AAPL and Walt Disney Co DIS are not interested in buying the social media company.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 1.5 percent to $50.57 while gold traded down 1.25 percent to $1,252.80.

Silver traded down 2.32 percent Thursday to $17.29, while copper fell 0.44 percent to $2.16.

Eurozone

European shares closed mostly lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 declined 0.40 percent, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 0.24 percent, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index gained 0.09 percent. Meanwhile the German DAX fell 0.16 percent, and the French CAC 40 declined 0.22 percent while U.K. shares fell 0.47 percent.

Economics

U.S. jobless claims declined 5,000 to 249,000 in the latest week. However, economists were expecting claims to reach 256,000 in the week.

Supplies of natural gas gained 80 billion cubic feet for the week ended September 30, the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported. Analysts expected a gain of 69 billion cubic feet.

Data on money supply for the recent week will be released at 4:30 p.m. ET.