Mid-Morning Market Update: Markets Open Lower; US Jobless Claims Increase To 218,000

U.S. stocks traded lower this morning, with the Dow Jones dipping more than 300 points on Thursday.

Following the market opening Thursday, the Dow traded down 1.07% to 31,152.28 while the NASDAQ fell 0.06% to 11,411.11. The S&P also fell, dropping, 0.52% to 3,903.35.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

Consumer discretionary shares rose by 0.9% on Thursday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included MEDIROM Healthcare Technologies Inc. MRM, up 5% and Codere Online Luxembourg, S.A. CDRO up 10%.

In trading on Thursday, consumer staples shares dipped 1.9%.

Top Headline

US initial jobless claims rose by 21 thousand to 218 thousand in the week ended May 14th, compared to a revised 197 thousand in the prior period.

Equities Trading UP

NeuroMetrix, Inc. NURO shares shot up 34% to $4.1850 after the company announced the FDA has granted De Novo authorization to market the Quell neuromodulation device as an aid for reducing the symptoms of fibromyalgia.

Shares of Grab Holdings Limited GRAB got a boost, shooting 25% to $3.1750 after reporting Q1 results.

SIGA Technologies, Inc. SIGA shares were also up, gaining 25% to $9.26 after the company announced the FDA approved the intravenous formulation of TPOXX for the treatment of smallpox.

Equities Trading DOWN

Bright Green Corporation BGXX shares tumbled 54% to $22.04 after jumping 90% on Wednesday. Bright Green, went public on the NASDAQ Tuesday, becoming the first U.S. plant-touching company to list on a major U.S. stock exchange.

Shares of Prenetics Holding Company Limited PRE were down 24% to $5.78.

Triumph Group, Inc. TGI was down, falling 17% to $14.94 as Baird lowered the price target on the stock from $36 to $26. Triumph Group, on Wednesday, reported worse-than-expected Q4 EPS and sales results.

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Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded down 1.3% to $108.19, while gold traded up 1.4% to $1,841.20.

Silver traded up 1.4% to $21.85 on Thursday while copper rose 1.6% to $4.2450.

Euro zone

European shares were lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 dropped 1.9%, London’s FTSE 100 fell 2.2% and Spain’s IBEX 35 Index rose 1%. The German DAX dipped 1.9%, French CAC 40 fell 1.9% and Italy’s FTSE MIB Index fell 1.4%.

The Eurozone current account surplus shrank to EUR 8.7 billion in March from EUR 39.7 billion in the year-ago month.

Economics

US initial jobless claims rose by 21 thousand to 218 thousand in the week ended May 14th, compared to a revised 197 thousand in the prior period.

The Philadelphia Fed Manufacturing Index fell to 2.6 in May, the lowest in two years.

Existing home sales dropped by 2.4% to an annual rate of 5.61 million in April.

The index of leading economic indicators declined 0.3% for April.

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

Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis President Neel Kashkari is set to speak at 4:00 p.m. ET.

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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 84,692,700 cases with around 1,028,010 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 43,129,560 cases and 524,300 deaths, while Brazil reported over 30,741,810 COVID-19 cases with 665,370 deaths. In total, there were at least 525,197,370 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 6,295,030 deaths.