Mid-Afternoon Market Update: Beyond Meat Jumps After Strong Q1 Results; DocuSign Shares Slide

Toward the end of trading Friday, the Dow traded up 1.12 percent to 26009 while the NASDAQ rose 1.74 percent to 7,748. The S&P also rose, gaining 1.18 percent to 2,876.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Information technology shares rose 2.1 percent on Friday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Zoom Video Communications, Inc. ZM, up 19 percent, and MongoDB, Inc. MDB, up 13 percent.

In trading on Friday, financial shares fell by 0.1 percent.

Top Headline

Barnes & Noble, Inc. BKS has officially entered into a definitive agreement to be acquired by hedge fund Elliott Management for $6.50 per share in an all-cash transaction valued at approximately $683 million.

Following the close of the transaction, Elliott will own both Barnes & Noble and Waterstones, and each bookseller will operate independently but share a common CEO. James Daunt, CEO of Waterstones, will assume the role of CEO of Barnes & Noble following the completion of the transaction and will be based in New York.

The $6.50 per share purchase price represents a 43 percent premium to the 10-day volume weighted average closing share price of Barnes & Noble’s common stock ended June 5, 2019, the day before rumors of a potential transaction were reported in the media.

Equities Trading UP

Stewardship Financial Corporation SSFN shares shot up 73 percent to $15.36. Columbia Financial Inc CLBK announced plans to buy Stewardship Financial for $15.75 per share in cash.

Shares of Beyond Meat, Inc. BYND got a boost, shooting up 35 percent to $134.20 after the company reported stronger-than-expected results for its first quarter on Thursday.

FTD Companies, Inc. FTD shares were also up, gaining 49 percent to $0.2100 after Diamond Investment Group reported a 12 percent stake in the company. FTD 50 LLC also disclosed a 12 percent stake in the company.

Equities Trading DOWN

Domo, Inc. DOMO shares tumbled 12 percent to $28.08 after the company issued Q2 sales guidance below analyst estimates.

Shares of Charles & Colvard, Ltd. CTHR were down 19 percent to $1.6450. Charles & Colvard priced its 6.25 million share common stock offering at $1.60 per share.

DocuSign, Inc. DOCU was down, falling 13 percent to $47.87 after the company reported a quarter-over-quarter decline in subscription growth, offsetting strong Q1 earnings and upbeat Q2 guidance.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 1.9 percent to $53.60, while gold traded up 0.2 percent to $1,345.40.

Silver traded up 0.7 percent Friday to $15.015, while copper fell 1.1 percent to $2.6225.

Euro zone

European shares closed higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 rose 0.93 percent, the Spanish Ibex Index rose 0.73 percent, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index rose 0.91 percent. Meanwhile, the German DAX climbed 0.77 percent, and the French CAC 40 rose 1.62 percent while UK shares rose 0.99 percent.

Economics

The U.S. economy added 75,000 new jobs in May. However, economists were expecting a gain of 185,000 jobs. The unemployment rate remained at 3.6 percent in May.

U.S. wholesale inventories rose 0.8 percent for April.

The total number of active U.S. oil rigs declined by 11 to 789 rigs this week, Baker Hughes Inc reported.

Data on consumer credit for April will be released at 3:00 p.m. ET.