Mid-Day Market Update: Crude Oil Up 1.5%; Altimmune Shares Plunge

Midway through trading Friday, the Dow traded up 0.18 percent to 26,488.60 while the NASDAQ climbed 0.22 percent to 8,059.75. The S&P also rose, gaining 0.17 percent to 2,918.97.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Friday morning, the utilities shares rose 1.12 percent. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Genie Energy Ltd. GNE up 3 percent, and SCANA Corporation SCG up 3 percent.

In trading on Friday, financial shares fell 0.51 percent.

Top Headline

BlackBerry Ltd BB reported upbeat earnings for its second quarter.

BlackBerry posted quarterly adjusted earnings of $0.04 per share on sales of $210 million. However, analysts were expecting earnings of $0.01 per share on sales of $209.38 million.

Equities Trading UP

ChemoCentryx, Inc. CCXI shares shot up 16 percent to $12.51 after the company earlier withdrew its plans for a public offering of common stock.

Shares of Synthetic Biologics, Inc. SYN got a boost, shooting up 210 percent to $7.64.

CafePress Inc. PRSS shares were also up, gaining 13 percent to $1.46 after the company agreed to be acquired by Snapfish.

Equities Trading DOWN

Altimmune, Inc. ALT shares dropped 48 percent to $4.5800 after dropping 27.62 percent on Thursday. Altimmune priced its 2.4 million unit offering at $5.00 per share.

Shares of Geron Corporation GERN were down 24 percent to $1.7601 after dropping 63 percent on Thursday. Johnson & Johnson's Janssen unit decided to terminate a collaboration and licensing agreement it had with Geron since 2014.

Progress Software Corporation PRGS was down, falling around 15 percent to $36.11. Progress Software reported upbeat earnings for its third quarter, while sales missed views. The company also issued weak forecast for the fourth quarter.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 1.5 percent to $73.22 while gold traded up 0.61 percent to $1,194.70.

Silver traded up 2.73 percent Friday to $14.68, while copper rose 0.86 to $2.807.

Eurozone

European shares were lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 dropped 0.65 percent, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 1.28 percent, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index declined 3.4 percent. Meanwhile the German DAX dropped 1.36 percent, and the French CAC 40 declined 0.71 percent while U.K. shares fell 0.33 percent.

Economics

U.S. consumer spending rose 0.3 percent for August, versus economists’ expectations for a 0.3 percent increase. Personal income also increased 0.3 percent in August.

The Chicago PMI dropped to a reading of 60.4 for September, versus August's reading of 63.6.

The final reading of University of Michigan's consumer sentiment index slipped to 100.1 for September, versus preliminary reading of 100.8.

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

New York Federal Reserve Bank President John Williams is set to speak in New York at 4:45 p.m. ET.