Crude Oil Rises Over 2%; Target Earnings Top Expectations

U.S. stocks traded higher midway through trading, with the Dow Jones gaining more than 100 points on Wednesday.

The Dow traded up 0.31% to 33,115.24 while the NASDAQ rose 0.30% to 12,379.47. The S&P 500, also rose, gaining, 0.34% to 4,123.96.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

• Consumer discretionary shares rose by 1.4% on Wednesday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Studio City International Holdings Limited MSC, up 11%, and Purple Innovation, Inc. PRPL, up 12%.
• In trading on Wednesday, health care shares fell 0.6%.

Top Headline

Target Corp TGT reported better-than-expected results for its first quarter.

The company a sales growth of 0.6% year-on-year to $25.32 billion, beating the analyst consensus estimate of $25.29 billion. Adjusted EPS of $2.05 beat the analyst consensus of $1.76. Inventory at the April end was $12.6 billion, down 16.3% Y/Y.

It sees Q2 adjusted EPS of $1.30 - $1.70 against the Street view of $1.93; expects a low-single-digit decline in comparable sales.

Equities Trading UP

• Smart for Life, Inc. SMFL shares shot up 80% to $4.17. Smart for Life announced Wednesday that it had executed a strategic agreement with CloudKitchens for rapid local delivery of its new line of innovative, proprietary, and healthy high-protein ice cream bars.
• Shares of Motus GI Holdings, Inc. MOTS got a boost, shooting 33% to $0.96 after the company announced it completed the first clinical evaluation of the new Pure-Vu Gastro in upper gastrointestinal procedures to support FDA submission.
• National Western Life Group, Inc. NWLI shares were also up, gaining 38% to $368.00 after the company announced the exploration of strategic alternatives.

Equities Trading DOWN

• Intercept Pharmaceuticals, Inc. ICPT shares dropped 20% to $12.99 following a report suggesting FDA staff concluded Intercept Pharmaceuticals' OCA can cause significant drug-induced liver injury.
• Shares of Cerberus Cyber Sentinel Corporation CISO were down 33% to $0.20 after the company reported pricing of $4.0 million registered direct offering.
• Agilysys, Inc. AGYS was down, falling 14% to $66.75 after the company reported Q4 financial results.

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Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 2.4% to $72.58 while gold traded down 0.3% at $1,986.70.

Silver traded down 0.1% to $23.885 on Wednesday while copper rose 2.3% to $3.7515.

Stocks of crude oil in the US rose by 3.69 million barrels in the latest week, following a 3.618 million barrel growth a week ago, the API said Tuesday.

Euro zone

European shares were mixed today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 fell 0.15%, London’s FTSE 100 fell 0.31% while Spain’s IBEX 35 Index rose 0.16% The German DAX rose 0.31%, French CAC 40 rose 0.01% and Italy’s FTSE MIB Index declined 0.12%.

The Eurozone’s consumer price inflation increased to 7.0% in April versus the prior month's 13-month low level of 6.9%. Passenger car registrations in the European Union surged 17.2% year-over-year to 803,188 units in April.

Italy recorded a trade surplus of EUR 7.5 billion in March, versus a year-ago gap of EUR 0.8 billion. The unemployment rate in France came in steady at 7.1% for the first quarter.

Asia Pacific Markets

Asian markets closed mostly lower on Wednesday, with Japan’s Nikkei 225 gaining 0.84%, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index dropping 2.09% and China’s Shanghai Composite Index dropping 0.21%. India’s S&P BSE Sensex fell 0.6%.

The Japanese economy grew by 1.6% on an annualized basis in the first quarter, while industrial production in Japan increased by 1.1 % month-over-month in March. Average new home prices in China's major cities declined by 0.2% year-over-year during April. Australia's wage price index rose by 3.7% year-over-year in the first quarter.

Economics

• U.S. housing starts rose 2.2% month-over-month to an annualized rate of 1.401 million in April, versus market expectations of 1.4 million.
• Building permits in the U.S. dropped 1.5% to an annual rate of 1.416 million in April.

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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 106,831,280 cases with around 1,163,290 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 44,983,150 cases and 531,790 deaths, while France reported over 40,050,710 COVID-19 cases with 167,050 deaths. In total, there were at least 688,507,400 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 6,875,780 deaths.