Mid-Morning Market Update: Markets Open Higher; Walgreens Boots Alliance Earnings Beat Estimates

Following the market opening Monday, the Dow traded up 0.66% to 27136.82 while the NASDAQ rose 0.75% to 8304.54. The S&P also rose, gaining 0.61% to 3,040.9.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Communication services shares climbed 1% on Monday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Care.com, Inc. CRCM, up 14%, and Spotify Technology S.A. SPOT, up 13%.

In trading on Monday, real estate shares fell 0.7%.

Top Headline

Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc. WBA reported better-than-expected earnings for its fourth quarter.

Walgreens reported third-quarter earnings of $1.43 per share, which beat the analyst consensus estimate of $1.41 per share. The company reported quarterly sales of $33.95 billion, which missed the analyst consensus estimate of $33.90 billion.


Equities Trading UP

Tiffany & Co. TIF shares shot up 29% to $127.56 after luxury goods company LVMH said it held preliminary discussions with Tiffany to discuss an acquisition.

Shares of Xunlei Limited XNET surged 35% to $6.49 after surging 107.76% on Friday.

Liberty Property Trust LPT shares gained 16% to $58.81 after Prologis announced it would acquire the company for $12.6 billion in an all-stock deal.

Equities Trading DOWN

PG&E Corporation PCG shares tumbled 22% to $3.90 as the Public Safety Power Shutoff impact zone for the company expanded by over 90k due to extreme weather conditions. Investors are questioning the infrastructure of the company due to the constant shutoffs.

Shares of Actinium Pharmaceuticals, Inc. ATNM were down 25% to $0.2639 after the company reported results from the pivotal Iomab-B Phase 3 SIERRA trial.

Guardion Health Sciences, Inc. GHSI was down, falling 34% to $0.2874 after the company priced its 24.5 million unit offering at $0.342 per unit.

Commodities


In commodity news, oil traded down 0.3% to $56.50, while gold traded down 0.1% to $1,504.80.

Silver traded up 0.5% Monday to $18.02, while copper rose 0.4% to $2.686.

Euro zone

European shares were mostly higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 rose 0.1%, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 0.2%, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index climbed 0.1%. Meanwhile, the German DAX gained 0.3%, and the French CAC 40 rose 0.1% while UK shares fell 0.1%

Economics

The US goods trade deficit shrank to $70.4 billion in September, compared to $73.1 in the prior. Imports fell 2.3%, while exports declined 1.6 percent for September.

The Chicago Fed National Activity Index declined to a reading of -0.45 in September, versus a revised reading of +0.15 in the prior month.

U.S. wholesale inventories fell 0.3% to $677.4 billion in September.

The Dallas Fed manufacturing index for October is schedule for release at 10:30 a.m. ET.

The Treasury is set to auction 3-and 6-month bills at 11:30 a.m. ET.