Mid-Morning Market Update: Markets Mostly Lower Following Monday's Rally; UPS Earnings Top Views

US stocks started the first trading day of new month on a cautious note after recording gains on Monday. Wall Street closed the volatile January month with steep losses.

Following the market opening Tuesday, the Dow traded up 0.01% to 35,136.91 while the NASDAQ fell 0.57% to 14,158.63. The S&P also fell, dropping, 0.24% to 4,504.56.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

Industrials shares jumped 0.8% on Tuesday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included United Parcel Service, Inc. UPS, up 13% and Wallbox N.V. WBX up 5%.

In trading on Tuesday, information technology shares fell 0.8%.

Top Headline

United Parcel Service, Inc. UPS reported upbeat earnings for its fourth quarter.

UPS reported quarterly earnings of $3.59 per share, exceeding analysts’ estimates of $3.10 per share. The company’s quarterly sales came in at $27.80 billion, versus estimates of $27.06 billion. UPS boosted its quarterly dividend from $1.02 to $1.52 per share.

UPS expects consolidated revenue of about $102 billion vs. consensus of $100.01 billion, an adjusted operating margin of 13.7%, and an adjusted return on invested capital to be above 30%.

Equities Trading UP

Biofrontera Inc. BFRI shares shot up 23% to $4.1600. Biofrontera issued update on patient recruitment for Phase III study for the treatment of sBCC with Ameluz-PDT.

Shares of Immunic, Inc. IMUX got a boost, shooting 15% to $13.50. Hearing newsletter provider Oxford Club named the stock as new buy.

United Parcel Service, Inc. UPS shares were also up, gaining 14% to $230.80 after the company reported better-than-expected Q4 adjusted EPS and sales results and issued FY22 sales guidance above estimates.

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Equities Trading DOWN

Knightscope, Inc. KSCP shares tumbled 25% to $16.05 amid continued post-IPO volatility. The company, last week, priced its IPO at $10 per share.

Shares of Pitney Bowes Inc. PBI were down 20% to $4.94 after the company reported worse-than-expected Q4 EPS results.

Anavex Life Sciences Corp. AVXL was down, falling 19% to $10.65 as the company reported topline data from the Phase 3 AVATAR trial of ANAVEX2-73 (blarcamesine) in adult female patients with Rett syndrome.

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Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded down 0.7% to $87.57, while gold traded up 0.7% to $1,808.40.

Silver traded up 2.3% Tuesday to $22.90 while copper rose 1.4% to $4.3840.

Euro zone

European shares were higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 gained 1.2%, London’s FTSE 100 gained 0.9%, while Spain’s IBEX 35 Index rose 1.3%. The German DAX surged 1.1%, French CAC 40 gained 1% and Italy’s FTSE MIB Index climbed 1.2%.

The IHS Markit manufacturing PMI for Eurozone was revised lower to 58.7 in January versus a preliminary reading of 59. The IHS Markit/CIPS UK manufacturing PMI was revised higher to 57.3 in January from a preliminary level of 56.9, while consumer credit rose by GBP 0.8 billion in December. The unemployment rate in Italy fell to 9% in December, while unemployment rate in Germany fell to 5.1% in January.

Spain’s manufacturing PMI came in unchanged at 56.2 in January from the previous month, while French manufacturing PMI slipped to 55.5 in January from 55.6 in December. The annual inflation rate in France accelerated to 2.9% in January from 2.8% in December.

Economics

The Johnson Redbook Retail Sales Index surged 15.2% year-over-year during the first four weeks of January.

The IHS Markit final manufacturing PMI for January came in at 55.5 for January, versus the flash level of 55.0.

The ISM manufacturing index fell to 57.6 for January from previous reading of 58.7.

US construction spending rose 0.2% for December.

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COVID-19 Update

The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 76,222,210 cases with around 910,100 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 41,469,490 cases and 496,260 deaths, while Brazil reported over 25,454,100 COVID-19 cases with 627,360 deaths. In total, there were at least 379,662,510 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 5,694,060 deaths.