NASDAQ Down 150 Points; Crude Oil Rises 1%

U.S. stocks traded lower midway through trading, with the Nasdaq Composite dropping over 150 points on Friday.

The Dow traded down 0.88% to 30,688.38 while the NASDAQ fell 1.38% to 11,393.33. The S&P 500 also fell, dropping, 1.12% to 3,857.63.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

Utilities shares climbed 0.1% on Friday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Azure Power Global Limited AZRE, up 8% and TransAlta Corporation TAC up 3%.

In trading on Friday, industrials shares fell by 2.1%.

Top Headline

FedEx Corp FDX issued preliminary results.

The company said it now expects first-quarter revenue of approximately $23.2 billion and first-quarter adjusted earnings to be around $3.44 per share. FedEx has withdrawn its fiscal year 2023 earnings forecast. The company expects business conditions to weaken further in the second quarter.

Equities Trading UP

• Applied Optoelectronics, Inc. AAOI shares shot up 34% to $3.35 after the company announced the sale of its Chinese manufacturing facilities to Yuhan Optoelectronic Technology for $150 million.
• Shares of China Liberal Education Holdings Limited CLEU got a boost, shooting 14% to $1.0801. China Liberal Education entered into a non-binding letter of intent (LOI) to acquire all the outstanding equity interest in the new electric vehicle brand Aiways Holdings Limited.
• Harmonic Inc. HLIT shares were also up, gaining 8% to $12.05. Needham maintained Harmonic with a Buy and raised the price target from $15 to $17.

Equities Trading DOWN

• Esports Entertainment Group, Inc. GMBL shares tumbled 46% to $0.1749 after the company reported pricing of $7.5 million public offering of common stock and warrants.
• Shares of Aditxt, Inc. ADTX were down 56% to $4.54 after the company announced pricing of $20 million public offering of $6 per share. Dawson James downgraded Aditxt from Buy to Neutral.
• NCR Corporation NCR was down, falling 23% to $22.38 after the company announced it will separate into two independent, publicly traded companies – one focused on digital commerce, the other on ATMs.

Also check out: Fear Among US Investors Is Increasing, Here's Why

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 1.1% to $86.00, while gold traded up 0.6% at $1,687.60.

Silver traded up 0.9% to $19.45 on Friday while copper rose 0.6% to $3.5110.

Euro zone

European shares were lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 fell 1.17%, London’s FTSE 100 fell 0.29%, while Spain’s IBEX 35 Index fell 1.05%. The German DAX declined 1.3%, French CAC 40 fell 0.93% and Italy’s FTSE MIB Index slipped 0.86%.

Annual inflation rate in the Eurozone increased to a record of 9.1% in August, up from 8.9% in the previous month. Passenger car registrations in the European Union jumped 4.4% year-over-year to 650,305 units during August.

The annual inflation rate in Italy accelerated to 8.4% in August, recording the highest level in over 36 years. Italy recorded a trade deficit of EUR 0.361 billion in versus a year-ago surplus of EUR 8.575 billion. Retail sales in the UK fell 1.6% month-over-month in August, recording the biggest drop so far this year.

Economics

• The University of Michigan consumer sentiment rose to a five-month high of 59.5 in September from 58.2 in the previous month.
• The Baker Hughes North American rig count report for the latest week will be released at 1:00 p.m. ET.
• The Treasury International Capital report for July will be released 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 97,430,410 cases with around 1,078,010 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 44,522,770 cases and 528,270 deaths, while France reported over 34,831,390 COVID-19 cases with 154,640 deaths. In total, there were at least 616,221,110 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 6,526,110 deaths.