Ford Drops On Morgan Stanley Downgrade; Multimedia Games Shares Jump

Midway through trading Monday, the Dow traded down 0.05 percent to 17,129.66 while the NASDAQ surged 0.20 percent to 4,591.92. The S&P also fell, dropping 0.17 percent to 2,004.33.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Monday morning, the technology sector proved to be a source of strength for the market. Leading the sector was strength from Identiv INVE and Pixelworks PXLW.

Energy shares dropped 1.19 percent in trading on Monday. Meanwhile, top decliners in the sector included Callon Petroleum Company CPE, down 8.4 percent, and W&T Offshore WTI, off 5.7 percent.

Top Headline

Campbell Soup Company CPB reported in-line earnings for the fourth-quarter. However, the company issued a weak profit outlook for full year.

The Camden, New Jersey-based company posted quarterly earnings from continuing operations of $137 million, or $0.43 per share, up from $117 million, or $0.37 per share, in the year-ago period. Excluding non-recurring items, its adjusted EPS from continuing operations rose 14% to $0.49 from $0.43.

Its sales from continuing operations climbed 7% to $1.852 billion, while organic sales slipped 2%. However, analysts were expecting earnings of $0.49 per share on revenue of $1.87 billion.

Equities Trading UP

Multimedia Games Holding Company MGAM shares shot up 28.82 percent to $35.78 after the company agreed to be acquired by Global Cash Access Holdings GCA for $36.50 per share in cash.

Shares of Twitter TWTR got a boost, shooting up 3.75 percent to $52.60 on news that the company will be launching an e-commerce initiative.

Rackspace Hosting RAX shares were also up, gaining 6.02 percent to $39.48 on a Bloomberg report that CenturyLink CTL is seeking to acquire the company.

Equities Trading DOWN

Shares of Hyperion Therapeutics HPTX were down 8.43 percent to $25.31 after announcing the termination of DiaPep277 program.

Ford Motor Co F shares tumbled 2.22 percent to $16.76 after Morgan Stanley downgraded the stock from Overweight to Underweight and lowered the target price from $17 to $16.

Campbell Soup Company CPB was down, falling 1.93 percent to $43.68 after the company issued a weak profit outlook for the full year. The company also reported in-line earnings for the fourth-quarter.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded down 1.07 percent to $92.29, while gold traded down 0.94 percent to $1,255.40.

Silver traded down 0.50 percent Monday to $19.06, while copper rose 1.10 percent to $3.20.

Eurozone

European shares were mostly lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 fell 0.51 percent, the Spanish Ibex Index dropped 0.42 percent, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index declined 0.33 percent. Meanwhile, the German DAX rose 0.08 percent and the French CAC 40 fell 0.22 percent while UK shares dropped 0.40 percent.

Economics

The Treasury is set to auction 3-and 6-month bills.

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