Mid-Morning Market Update: Markets Tumble; Shire To Acquire NPS Pharmaceuticals For $5.2 Billion

Following the market opening Monday, the Dow traded down 0.77 percent to 17,601.64 while the NASDAQ slipped 0.88 percent to 4,662.69. The S&P also fell, dropping 0.93 percent to 2,025.80.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

In trading on Monday, healthcare shares were relative leaders, up on the day by about 0.20 percent. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included MWI Veterinary Supply, Inc. MWIV, up 8.2 percent, and NPS Pharmaceuticals, Inc. NPSP, up 8.2 percent.

Energy sector was the top decliner in the US market on Monday. Top losers in the sector included Goodrich Petroleum Corp. GDP, down 11.1 percent, Basic Energy Services, Inc. BAS, off 10.9 percent.

Top Headline

Shire PLC SHPG has agreed to acquire NPS Pharmaceuticals, Inc. NPSP for $5.2 billion or $46 per share.

This represents a 38% premium to the average price of NPS stock over the last 45 days and around a 10% premium to Friday's close.

Equities Trading UP

Foundation Medicine, Inc. FMI shares shot up 115.83 percent to $51.65 after Roche Holding AG RHHBY announced its plans to acquire up to 56.3% stake in Foundation Medicine for $1.03 billion. Roche will commence tender offer at $50.00 per share.

Shares of Tekmira Pharmaceuticals Corp TKMR got a boost, shooting up 46.12 percent to $22.94 on merger deal with OnCore Biopharma Inc.

Abengoa SA ABGB shares were also up, gaining 17.21 percent to $15.37 after the company announced the commencement of a 9.2 million secondary public offering of its shares of Abengoa Yield by selling shareholder Abengoa.

Equities Trading DOWN

Arrowhead Research Corp. ARWR shares tumbled 28.04 percent to $6.52 after the company announced the FDA clinical hold on its Hepatitis B study.

Shares of SanDisk Corp. SNDK were down 11.12 percent to $86.25 after the company lowered its Q4 sales outlook.

Sarepta Therapeutics, Inc. SRPT was down, falling 15.05 percent to $11.85 after releasing results of its Phase IIb open-label extension study of eteplirsen in patients with Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD).

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded down 3.18 percent to $46.82, while gold traded up 0.64 percent to $1,223.90.

Silver traded up 0.68 percent Monday to $16.53, while copper fell 1.40 percent to $2.72.

Eurozone

European shares were higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 jumped 0.67 percent, the Spanish Ibex Index surged 0.85 percent, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index gained 0.69 percent. Meanwhile, the German DAX rose 1.12 percent, and the French CAC 40 climbed 1.18 percent while UK shares gained 0.02 percent.

Economics

The Treasury is set to auction 3-and 6-month bills. The Treasury will also auction 3-year notes.