Dow Rises 150 Points As Fed Boosts Rates By 0.75 Percentage Points

U.S. stocks traded higher toward the end of trading, with the Dow Jones gaining more than 150 points on Wednesday.

The Dow traded up 0.49% to 31,915.65 while the NASDAQ rose 2.83% to 11,889.90. The S&P also rose, gaining, 1.59% to 3,983.55.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

Communication services shares rose 3.9% on Wednesday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Leafly Holdings, Inc. LFLY, up 39% and Spotify Technology S.A.. SPOT up 12%.

In trading on Wednesday, utilities shares fell 0.2%.

Top Headline

The Federal Reserve boosted rates by 75 bps.

Equities Trading UP

Blue Water Vaccines, Inc. BWV shares shot up 54% to $3.1650. Blue Water Vaccines recently announced signing of sponsored research agreement with Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center for S&P vaccine platform development.

Shares of Pzena Investment Management, Inc PZN got a boost, shooting 46% to $9.43 as the company said it has entered into an agreement to become a private company. The company also reported a rise quarterly sales.

Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Limited TEVA shares were also up, gaining 23% to $8.76 after the company reported better-than-expected financial results.

Equities Trading DOWN

F45 Training Holdings Inc. FXLV shares tumbled 65% to $1.24 after the company cut its FY22 sales guidance to below analyst estimates. Macquarie and Baird downgraded the stock to Neutral.

Shares of Cassava Sciences, Inc. SAVA were down 22% to $16.90. The U.S. Justice Department has opened a criminal investigation into Cassava Sciences on whether it manipulated research results for its investigational Alzheimer's drug, Reuters reported citing two people familiar with the inquiry.

ObsEva SA OBSV was down, falling 73% to $0.4351 after the company announced a restructuring and the termination of the license agreement with Kissei for linzagolix.

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Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 3% to $97.87, while gold traded up 0.1% to $1,719.10.

Silver traded up 0.4% to $18.615 on Wednesday while copper rose 1.5% to $3.4345.

Euro zone

European shares closed higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 rose 0.47%, London’s FTSE 100 gained 0.57% while Spain’s IBEX 35 Index rose 0.68%. The German DAX gained 0.53%, French CAC 40 rose 0.75% and Italy’s FTSE MIB Index gained 1.52%.

Loans to households in the Eurozone increased 4.6% year-over-year in June. Italian consumer confidence fell to 94.8 in July from 98.3 a month ago, while manufacturing confidence declined to 106.7 in July from a revised 109.5. Consumer confidence in France declined for the seventh month running to 80 in July.

Economics

U.S. durable goods orders increased 1.9% from a month ago in June.

The goods gap in the US shrank to $98.2 billion in June from a revised $104 billion in May.

Wholesale inventories in the US rose 1.9% month-over-month to $896.0 billion in June.

Pending home sales in the US dropped 8.6% month-over-month in June, after rising 0.4% in May.

US crude oil inventories dropped by 4.523 million barrels in the week ended July 22, the most in 8 weeks and higher than analysts’ estimates for a 1.037-million-barrel declined, the Energy Information Administration said.

The Federal Reserve boosted rates by 75 bps.

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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 92,494,010 cases with around 1,052,930 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 43,938,760 cases and 526,160 deaths, while Brazil reported over 33,660,600 COVID-19 cases with 677,560 deaths. In total, there were at least 577,475,760 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 6,407,980 deaths.