US Stocks Mostly Lower; Target Posts Downbeat Earnings

U.S. stocks traded mostly lower this morning, with the Nasdaq Composite falling by more than 50 points on Wednesday.

Following the market opening Wednesday, the Dow traded down 0.05% to 43,245.35 while the NASDAQ fell 0.36% to 18,918.89. The S&P 500 also rose, gaining, 0.28% to 5,900.34.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

Energy shares rose by 0.4% on Wednesday.

In trading on Wednesday, consumer discretionary shares fell by 0.9%.

Top Headline

Target Corporation TGT reported downbeat results for the third quarter and lowered its FY24 outlook on Wednesday.

The company reported third-quarter adjusted earnings per share of $1.85, missing the street view of $2.30. Quarterly total revenue of $25.67 billion (+1.1% year over year) missed the analyst consensus estimate of $25.90 billion.

For FY24, the company now forecasts adjusted EPS between $8.30 and $8.90, down from the previous guidance of $9.00 to $9.70. The revised FY24 EPS outlook is also below the consensus estimate of $9.55. Target expects its fourth-quarter adjusted EPS to range between $1.85 and $2.45, below the consensus estimate of $2.66.

Equities Trading UP
                       

• Quantum-Si incorporated QSI shares shot up 182% to $1.79 after the company announced a distribution agreement with Avantor for next-generation protein sequencing portfolios for researchers.
• Shares of Silexion Therapeutics Corp SLXN got a boost, surging 97% to $0.4499 after the company announced Guangzhou Sino-Israel bio-industry investment fund reported a 13.8% stake in the company.
• Forte Biosciences, Inc. FBRX shares were also up, gaining 67% to $9.27 after the company secured $53 million in oversubscribed private placement to advance FB102 clinical programs across autoimmune indications, with key data readouts expected in 2025.

Equities Trading DOWN

• X3 Holdings Co., Ltd. XTKG shares dropped 33% to $0.0973. The company announced a 1-for-20 reverse stock split.
• Shares of PainReform Ltd. PRFX were down 27% to $1.0200 after the company announced initial topline data for PRF-110 Phase 3 clinical trial.
• Volato Group, Inc. SOAR was down, falling 22% to $0.3677. Volato reported $40.3 million in revenue and confirmed NYSE acceptance of compliance plan in third quarter 10-Q.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 1% to $70.09 while gold traded up 0.2% at $2,636.90.

Silver traded down 0.3% to $31.160 on Wednesday, while copper rose 0.8% to $4.1730.

Euro zone

European shares were higher today. The eurozone's STOXX 600 gained 0.5%, Germany's DAX gained 0.5% and France's CAC 40 rose 0.4%. Spain's IBEX 35 Index rose 0.5%, while London's FTSE 100 rose 0.2%.

Construction output in the Eurozone fell by 1.6% year-over-year in September compared to a 2.5% decline in the previous month. Producer prices in Germany fell by 1.1% year-over-year in October.

UK's producer prices declined by 0.8% year-over-year in October versus a revised 0.6% fall in September. Annual inflation rate in the UK rose to 2.3% in October from 1.7% in September.

Asia Pacific Markets

Asian markets closed mostly higher on Wednesday, with Japan's Nikkei 225 falling 0.16%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index gaining 0.21% and China's Shanghai Composite Index gaining 0.66%.

Japan's trade deficit shrank to JPY 461.25 billion in October compared to JPY 702.86 in the year-ago month.

Economics

Mortgage applications in the U.S. rose 1.7% from the previous week in the week ending Nov. 15, compared to a 0.5% gain in the prior period.

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