Mid-Afternoon Market Update: Dow Rises 50 Points; 360 Finance Shares Spike Higher

Toward the end of trading Wednesday, the Dow traded up 0.18% to 28,171.68 while the NASDAQ rose 0.6% to 8,699.41. The S&P also rose, gaining 0.37% to 3,152.16.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Consumer discretionary shares climbed 0.8% on Wednesday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Centric Brands Inc. CTRC, up 9%, and NIO Limited NIO, up 9%.

In trading on Wednesday, industrial shares fell 0.1%.

Top Headline

Deere & Company DE reported upbeat sales for its fourth quarter, but issued weak outlook for fiscal 2020.

Deere reported fourth-quarter earnings of $2.14 per share on Tuesday, versus the analyst consensus estimate of $2.14. The company reported quarterly sales of $8.703 billion, which beat the analyst consensus estimate of $8.44 billion.

Deere said it projects fiscal 2020 net income of $2.7 billion to $3.1 billion, versus analysts’ estimates of $3.5 billion. The company expects FY20 agriculture & turf equipment sales to decline 5%-10% and construction & forestry sales to drop 10%-15%.

Equities Trading UP

AVX Corporation AVX shares shot up 37% to $20.54 after Kyocera announced a proposal to acquire all shares of the company it does not own for $19.50/share.

Shares of 360 Finance, Inc. QFIN got a boost, shooting up 16% to $9.07 after the company reported Q3 results. The company also disclosed that Fountainvest became a significant shareholder of company and Eric Xiaohuan Chen, who was designated by Fountainvest, was appointed to its board.

Ocugen, Inc. OCGN shares were also up, gaining 25% to $0.3850 after Chardan Capital initiated coverage on the company's stock with a Buy rating and a $2 price target. The company also reported insider buying of 200K shares.

Equities Trading DOWN

Evolent Health, Inc. EVH shares tumbled 29% to $7.57 after Passport Health, which is owned by the company, was left out of large Medicaid contracts in Kentucky.

Shares of Central Garden & Pet Company CENT were down 20% to $25.26 after the company reported worse-than-expected Q4 earnings.

Aravive, Inc. ARAV was down, falling 15% to $8.03 after the company reported pricing of public offering of common stock at $7.50 per share.

Commodities


In commodity news, oil traded down 0.9% to $57.89, while gold traded down 0.5% to $1,453.60.

Silver traded down 0.7% Wednesday to $16.925, while copper fell 0.1% to $2.6765.

Euro zone


European shares closed mostly higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 rose 0.32%, the Spanish Ibex Index rose 0.41%, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index slipped 0.26%. Meanwhile, the German DAX gained 0.38%, and the French CAC 40 fell 0.05% while UK shares rose 0.36%.

Economics

U.S. durable goods orders increased 0.6% in October, versus a revised 1.4% drop in the prior month.

The US economy increased by an annualized 2.1% in the third quarter, versus an advance estimate of 1.9% and compared to a 2.0% growth in the prior three-month period.

Initial jobless claims fell 15,000 to 213,000 in the latest week.

U.S. personal income was unchanged for October, versus a 0.3% rise in September. Consumer spending increased 0.3% in October, compared to a 0.2% increase in September.

The pending home sales index fell 1.7% for October.

The Chicago PMI rose to 46.3 in November, versus a reading of 43.2 in October.

U.S. crude oil inventories rose 1.572 million barrels for the latest week, the Energy Information Administration reported. However, analysts were expecting a decline of 418,000 barrels.

Domestic supplies of natural gas fell 28 billion cubic feet for the latest week, the Energy Information Administration reported. Analysts projected a decline of 89 billion cubic feet.

The total number of active U.S. oil rigs slipped by 3 rigs this week, Baker Hughes Inc reported.

The Federal Open Market Committee released its latest Beige Book report.

Data on farm prices for October will be released at 3:00 p.m. ET.