Dow Rises 50 Points; Fed's Preferred Inflation Gauge Cools In November

U.S. stocks traded higher this morning, with the Dow Jones index gaining more than 50 points on Friday.

Following the market opening Friday, the Dow traded up 0.14% to 37,458.12 while the NASDAQ rose 0.30% to 15,008.08. The S&P 500 also rose, gaining, 0.31% to 4,761.25.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

Energy shares jumped by 0.8% on Friday.

In trading on Friday, consumer discretionary shares fell by 0.2%.

Top Headline

Core PCE prices in the U.S. rose by 0.1% from the prior month in November. When energy and food are excluded from the overall PCE basket, core PCE inflation eased to 3.2% year-on-year, down from 3.5% a month earlier and below the expected 3.3%.

Equities Trading UP

Karuna Therapeutics, Inc. KRTX shares shot up 47% to $317.10. Bristol Myers Squibb & Co BMY agreed to acquire Karuna Therapeutics for $330.00 per share in cash, for a total equity value of $14.0 billion, or $12.7 billion net of estimated cash acquired.

Shares of Royalty Management Holding Corporation RMCO got a boost, surging 99% to $3.95. Royalty Management Holding announced that Ferrox Holdings confirmed the commencement of production of titanium ferrite from its Tivani operating site.

NextPlay Technologies, Inc. NXTP shares were also up, gaining 102% to $1.8297.

Equities Trading DOWN

AlloVir, Inc. ALVR shares dropped 67% to $0.7699 after the company provided an update on its three Phase 3 clinical trials with posoleucel, an investigational off-the-shelf multi-virus-specific T cell therapy, which targets six viral pathogens in immunocompromised individuals: adenovirus (AdV), BK virus (BKV), cytomegalovirus (CMV), Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), human herpesvirus-6 (HHV-6) and JC virus (JCV).

Shares of Cyclacel Pharmaceuticals, Inc. CYCC were down 27% to $2.63 after the company announced a registered direct and private placement offering priced at-the-market under Nasdaq rules.

Netcapital Inc. NCPL was down, falling 40% to $0.1971 after the company announced pricing of a $4 million public offering.

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Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 0.9% to $74.52 while gold traded up 1.4% at $2,080.20.

Silver traded up 0.8% to $24.77 on Friday while copper rose 0.3% to $3.9295.

Euro zone

European shares were mostly higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 rose 0.1%, London’s FTSE 100 rose 0.1% while Spain’s IBEX 35 Index rose 0.3% The German DAX rose 0.2% French CAC 40 rose 0.1%, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index gained 0.2%.

The consumer confidence index in Italy climbed to 106.7 in December from 103.6 a month ago, while manufacturing confidence index fell to 95.4 in December from 96.6 in November. Spanish economy grew by 0.3% quarter-over-quarter during the third quarter.

Producer prices in the French domestic market rose by 2.4% month-over-month in November compared to a revised 0.1% decline a month ago, while consumer confidence increased to 89 in December versus a revised 88 in the prior month.

The British economy grew by 0.3% year-over-year in the third quarter, while current account deficit shrank to £17.2 billion in the third quarter of versus a revised £24.0 billion gap in the prior period. Retail sales in the U.K. rose by 1.3% from a month ago in November.

Asia Pacific Markets

Asian markets closed mixed on Friday, with Japan’s Nikkei 225 gaining 0.09%, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index falling 1.69% and China’s Shanghai Composite Index falling 0.13%. India’s S&P BSE Sensex, meanwhile, rose 0.34%.

The annual inflation rate in Japan fell to 2.8% in November from 3.3% in the earlier month, while food prices in Japan increased by 7.3% from a year ago in November.

Economics

New orders for manufactured durable goods rose by 5.4% month-over-month in November.

Building permits in the U.S. declined by 2.1% to an annual rate of 1.467 million in November versus the preliminary estimate of 1.460 million.

Personal income in the U.S. rose by 0.4% month-over-month in November, while personal spending increased by 0.2% from a month ago in November.

Core PCE prices in the U.S. rose by 0.1% from the prior month in November. However, core prices rose by 3.2% from the prior year, compared to market estimates of 3.3%.

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