Mid-Afternoon Market Update: MuleSoft Gains Following Report Of Takeover Interest From Salesforce; Proteostasis Therapeutics Shares Slide

Toward the end of trading Tuesday, the Dow traded up 0.45 percent to 24,722.29 while the NASDAQ gained 0.15 percent to 7,355.20. The S&P also rose, gaining 0.08 percent to 2,715.02.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Tuesday afternoon, the energy shares gained 0.95 percent. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Profire Energy, Inc. PFIE, up 7 percent, and PBF Energy Inc. PBF, up 5 percent.

In trading on Tuesday, telecommunication services shares fell 1.16 percent.

Top Headline

Oracle Corporation ORCL shares fell over 6 percent in after-hours trading despite reporting a third quarter earnings beat. Adjusted earnings came in at 83 cents per share, beating estimates by 11 cents. Sales came in at $9.776 billion, versus estimates of $9.781 billion.

The company also reported that third quarter cloud SaaS sales were up 33 percent year-over-year.

Equities Trading UP

Arena Pharmaceuticals, Inc. ARNA shares shot up 29 percent to $39.87 as the company reported topline Phase 2 results from an ongoing trial of etrasimod called OASIS after Monday's market close.

Shares of MuleSoft, Inc. MULE got a boost, shooting up 24 percent to $40.7852 after the company was named as a potential acquisition target. Mulesoft, a provider of integration software for connecting applications, data and devices, is in advanced talks to be acquired by salesforce.com, inc. CRM, Reuters reported.

Marinus Pharmaceuticals, Inc. MRNS shares were also up, gaining 10 percent to $4.50. Mizuho initiated coverage on Marinus Pharmaceuticals with a Buy rating and a $13.00 price target.

Equities Trading DOWN

Proteostasis Therapeutics, Inc. PTI shares dropped 22 percent to $5.46 after reporting proposed public offering of common stock. The company plans on offering and selling nine million shares of its common stock. The stock is still up nearly 60 percent since March 9.

Shares of Northern Oil and Gas, Inc NOG were down 19 percent to $1.873 after the company announced a $105 million offering. The company also raised FY18 production growth guidance.

Duluth Holdings Inc. DLTH was down, falling around 9 percent to $17.22. Duluth posted upbeat results for its fourth quarter, but issued weak forecast for FY18.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 2.06 percent to $63.34 while gold traded down 0.43 percent to $1,312.10.

Silver traded down 0.86 percent Tuesday to $16.185, while copper fell 1.36 percent to $3.04.

Eurozone

European shares closed higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 gained 0.51 percent, the Spanish Ibex Index rose 0.18 percent, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index rose 0.73 percent. Meanwhile the German DAX gained 0.74 percent, and the French CAC 40 climbed 0.57 percent while U.K. shares rose 0.26 percent.

Economics

The Federal Open Market Committee begins its two-day policy meeting today.