Mid-Afternoon Market Update: Crude Oil Up 1.25%; Straight Path Shares Plunge

Toward the end of trading Thursday, the Dow traded down 0.23 percent to 20,894.99 while the NASDAQ declined 0.27 percent to 6,112.52. The S&P also fell, dropping 0.33 percent to 2,391.65.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Non-cyclical consumer goods & services sector was the top gainer in the US market on Thursday. Top gainers in the sector included TETRA Technologies, Inc. TTI, CARBO Ceramics Inc. CRR, and Atwood Oceanics, Inc. ATW.

In trading on Thursday, telecommunications services shares were relative laggards, down on the day by about 0.78 percent. Meanwhile, top losers in the sector included Black Box Corporation BBOX, down 6 percent, and Cincinnati Bell Inc. CBB, down 6 percent.

Top Headline

Macy's Inc M reported weaker-than-expected results for its first quarter.

Macy's said it earned $0.24 per share in the first quarter on revenue of $5.33 billion; Analysts were expecting the company to earn $0.34 per share on revenue of $5.55 billion.

Equities Trading UP

Sangamo Therapeutics Inc SGMO shares shot up 52 percent to $6.62 after the company reported a strategic collaboration with Pfizer Inc. PFE for Hemophilia A Phase 1/2 therapy program. The company also posted a narrower-than-expected quarterly loss.

Shares of Real Industry Inc RELY got a boost, shooting up 33 percent to $3.25 following Q1 results. Real Industry reported a Q1 loss of $0.43 per share on revenue of $337.1 million.

LivePerson, Inc. LPSN shares were also up, gaining 24 percent to $9.82. LivePerson posted in-line quarterly earnings, while sales exceeded estimates.

Equities Trading DOWN

ITUS Corp ITUS shares dropped 37 percent to $1.08. ITUS disclosed that it has priced its 3.5 million share offering at $1.05 per share.

Shares of Snap Inc SNAP were down around 21 percent to $18.17. Snap reported a Q1 loss of $2.31 per share, versus a year-ago loss of $0.14 per share. Its sales for the quarter came in at $149.64 million Daily active users grew to 166 million, up from 122 million in the year-ago period. JP Morgan lowered the price target on Snap from $24.00 to $20.00, while Citigroup cut the price target from $27.00 to $24.00.

Straight Path Communications Inc STRP was down, falling around 20 percent to $178.40 after the company confirmed Thursday morning it has agreed to be acquired by Verizon Communications Inc. VZ in a deal which values shares at $184. Thursday's announcement concludes a bidding war whereby Straight Path confirmed on three separate occasions that a "multi-national company," since identified as Verizon, presented offers that were superior to AT&T Inc. T's offer of $95.63 per share.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 1.25 percent to $47.92 while gold traded up 0.39 percent to $1,223.70.

Silver traded up 0.45 percent Thursday to $16.28, while copper rose 0.62 percent to $2.51.

Eurozone

European shares closed lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 dropped 0.52 percent, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 1.57 percent, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index fell 0.33 percent. Meanwhile the German DAX declined 0.67 percent, and the French CAC 40 slipped 0.71 percent while U.K. shares rose 0.02 percent.

Economics

U.S. initial jobless claims dropped 2,000 to 236,000 for the latest week. However, economists were expecting claims 245,000 to reach in the week.

The Producer Price Index rose 0.5 percent for April, versus economists’ expectations for a 0.2 percent growth.

Supplies of natural gas increased 45 billion cubic feet for the week ended May 5, the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported. Analysts expected a gain of 53 billion cubic feet.

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