Mid-Morning Market Update: Markets Mixed; Walgreens Profit Misses Expectations

Following the market opening Thursday, the Dow traded down 0.40% to 25962.51 while the NASDAQ rose 0.61% to 10556.82. The S&P also rose, gaining 0.15% to 3,165.11.

The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 3,055,140 cases with around 132,300 deaths. Brazil confirmed a total of over 1,713,160 COVID-19 cases with 67,960 deaths, while India reported a total of at least 767,290 confirmed cases and 21,120 deaths. In total, there were at least 12,062,860 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with over 549,900 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Information technology shares climbed 0.6% on Thursday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Veritone Inc VERI, up 24%, and Exfo Inc EXFO, up 9%.

In trading on Thursday, utilities shares fell 1.5%.

Top Headline

Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc WBA reported weaker-than-expected earnings for its third quarter, while sales exceeded views.

Walgreens reported quarterly earnings of $0.83 per share, missing analysts’ estimates of $1.18 per share. The company reported sales of $34.60 billion, exceeding expectations of $34.32 billion.

Walgreens said it expects FY20 adjusted earnings of $4.65 to $4.75 per share, versus analysts’ estimates of $5.42 per share.

Equities Trading UP

Document Security Systems, Inc. DSS shares shot up 31% to $8.47. The company's target acquisition unit, Impact Biomedical, published results from in-vitro testing of two proprietary compounds plus 3F Biofragrance that demonstrated successful surface disinfecting.

Shares of Altimmune, Inc. ALT got a boost, shooting 24% to $21.04. Altimmune said it has entered into a teaming agreement with DynPort Vaccine Company, a General Dynamics Information Technology company, to coordinate U.S. government funding efforts and, if successful, to provide program management, drug development activity integrationand regulatory support for AdCOVID, its single-dose intranasal COVID-19 vaccine candidate.

Veritone, Inc. VERI shares were also up, gaining 27% to $15.41 after the company raised Q2 sales guidance.

Equities Trading DOWN

Bed Bath & Beyond Inc. BBBY shares tumbled 20% to $8.33 after the company reported worse-than-expected Q1 results.

Shares of China Finance Online Co. Limited JRJC were down 13% to $8.89 after climbing 41% on Wednesday.

AgroFresh Solutions, Inc. AGFS was down, falling 12% to $2.24.

Commodities


In commodity news, oil traded up 0.1% to $40.91, while gold traded down 0.2% to $1,816.20.

Silver traded up 0.7% Thursday to $19.30, while copper rose 1.5% to $2.8675.

Euro zone

European shares were mostly lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 rose 0.2%, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 0.4%, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index fell 0.7%. Meanwhile, the German DAX 30 gained 1.2%, French CAC 40 slipped 0.1% and UK shares fell 0.7%.

Economics

U.S. initial jobless claims declined to 1.314 million for the latest week, versus prior reading of 1.427 million. However, analysts were expecting a reading of 1.375 million.

U.S. wholesale inventories rose 5.4% for May, versus analysts’ expectations for a 4% decline.

The Energy Information Administration’s weekly report on natural gas stocks in underground storage is scheduled for release at 10:30 a.m. ET.

The Treasury will auction 4-and 8-week bills at 11:30 a.m. ET.

Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta President Raphael Bostic is set to speak at 12:00 p.m. ET.

The Treasury is set to auction 30-year bonds at 1:00 p.m. ET.

Data on money supply for the recent week will be released at 4:30 p.m. ET.