Dow Rises 150 Points; Mission Produce Shares Slide

U.S. stocks traded mostly higher toward the end of trading, with the Dow Jones gaining around 150 points on Friday.

The Dow traded up 0.45% to 33,176.46 while the NASDAQ fell 0.02% to 10,473.83. The S&P 500 also rose, gaining, 0.42% to 3,838.36.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

Energy shares rose by 2.8% on Friday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included GeoPark Ltd GPRK, up 10%, and Hallador Energy Company HNRG, up 12%.

In trading on Friday, information technology shares fell by 0.2%.

Top Headline

Personal spending rose 0.1% month-over-month in November, while personal consumption expenditure price index rose by 5.5% year-over-year in November. Personal income in the United States rose 0.4% from a month ago in November.

Equities Trading UP

• Expion360 Inc. XPON shares shot up 152% to $2.48 after the company announced it has been selected as the exclusive supplier of high-energy lithium ion batteries for an overland trailer to be branded and sold by a top U.S. sports utility vehicle manufacturer.
• Shares of DBV Technologies S.A. DBVT got a boost, shooting 19% to $1.40 after the company announced the FDA has lifted the partial clinical hold on its VITESSE Phase 3 Pivotal Trial.
• Immuron Limited IMRN shares were also up, gaining 27% to $2.05 after the company received FDA approval for Travelan IND application.

Equities Trading DOWN

• Atai Life Sciences N.V. ATAI shares tumbled 11% to $2.70. The company reported results from the Kures Therapeutics Phase 1 trial of KUR-10.
• Shares of Mission Produce, Inc. AVO were down 15% to $12.39 after the company reported weaker-than-expected results for its fourth quarter on Thursday.
• Applied Molecular Transport Inc. AMTI was down, falling 58% to $0.43 after the company announced top-line Phase 2 results from the LOMBARD monotherapy trial, in which the company saw similar clinical remission rates in patients receiving AMT-101 compared to the placebo at week 12.

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Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 3% to $79.83 while gold traded up 0.6% at $1,805.20.

Silver traded up 1.4% to $23.955 on Friday while copper rose 1.4% to $3.8090.

Euro zone

European shares were mostly higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 gained 0.04%, London’s FTSE 100 rose 0.05% while Spain’s IBEX 35 Index fell 0.04%. The German DAX gained 0.19%, French CAC 40 fell 0.20% and Italy’s FTSE MIB Index rose 0.27%.

Producer prices in Spain climbed 20.7% year-over-year in November, while the country’s quarterly economic growth was revised lower to 0.1% in the third quarter versus a preliminary reading of 0.2%. Producer prices in the French domestic markets increased 1.2% month-over-month in November.

Asia Pacific Markets

Asian markets closed lower on Friday, with the Japan’s Nikkei dropping 1.03% and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index falling 0.44%. China’s Shanghai Composite Index fell 0.28%.

Foreign direct investment into China surged 9.9% year-over-year to CNY 1.16 trillion during the first eleven months of the year. The core consumer price index in Japan rose 3.7% from a year ago in November.

Economics

• Personal spending rose 0.1% month-over-month in November, while personal consumption expenditure price index rose by 5.5% year-over-year in November. Personal income in the United States rose 0.4% from a month ago in November.
• Durable goods orders in the US dropped by 2.1% month-over-month in November.
• The University of Michigan consumer sentiment was revised higher to 59.7 in December from a preliminary reading of 59.1

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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 102,048,470 cases with around 1,114,930 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 44,677,590 cases and 530,680 deaths, while France reported over 39,025,730 COVID-19 cases with 160,870 deaths. In total, there were at least 659,881,370 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 6,678,920 deaths.