Following the market opening Thursday, the Dow traded down 0.29% to 32,325.08 while the NASDAQ rose 0.07% to 12,970.46. The S&P also fell, dropping 0.08% to 3,886.13.
The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 30,011,550 cases with around 545,280 deaths. Brazil reported over 12,220,010 COVID-19 cases with 300,680 deaths, while India confirmed a total of at least 11,787,530 cases and 160,690 deaths. In total, there were at least 124,894,100 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 2,745,700 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
Leading and Lagging Sectors
Utilities shares rose 0.4% on Thursday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Korea Electric Power Corporation KEP, up 1%, and Clearway Energy, Inc. CWEN, up 2%.
In trading on Thursday, energy shares fell 1.9%.
Top Headline
Darden Restaurants, Inc. DRI reported better-than-expected results for its third quarter and issued strong guidance for the current quarter.
Darden posted quarterly earnings of $0.98 per share, exceeding analysts’ estimates of $0.69 per share. The company’s quarterly sales came in at $1.73 billion, versus expectations of $1.63 billion.
Darden Restaurants said it sees Q4 earnings of $1.60 to $1.70 per share, on sales of $2.1 billion. Analysts had expected EPS of $1.24 per share on sales of $1.95 billion.
Equities Trading UP
Cellect Biotechnology Ltd. APOP shares shot up 63% to $5.70 after the company and Quoin Pharmaceuticals announced a strategic merger.
Shares of Houston Wire & Cable Company HWCC got a boost, shooting 40% to $5.32 after the company announced it will be acquired by OmniCable for $91 million.
Immutep Limited IMMP shares were also up, gaining 40% to $3.6895.
Check out these big movers of the day
Equities Trading DOWN
WISeKey International Holding AG WKEY shares tumbled 26% to $15.23. WISeKey shares jumped over 100% on Wednesday after the company announced the launch of WISeArt, a certificate of authenticity — a "non-fungible token" — that will live forever on the blockchain, unchanged and unchallengeable, as proof of the buyer's ownership.
Shares of Evofem Biosciences, Inc. EVFM were down 21% to $1.8450 after the company reported pricing of $30 million public offering of common stock.
Rite Aid Corporation RAD was down, falling 20% to $18.62 after the company issued an update on FY2021 guidance. The company said it expects to report a FY21 net loss of $90 million to $100 million on sales of $23.98 billion to $24.00 billion.
Commodities
In commodity news, oil traded down 1.5% to $60.27, while gold traded down 0.2% to $1,729.60.
Silver traded down 1.3% Thursday to $24.905 while copper fell 2.2% to $3.9760.
Euro zone
European shares were lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 fell 0.1%, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 0.7% and the German DAX 30 dropped 0.2%. Meanwhile, the French CAC 40 fell 0.2%, London’s FTSE 100 fell 0.2% and Italy’s FTSE MIB slipped 0.1%.
German GfK Consumer Climate Indicator rose to -6.2 heading into April versus a revised reading of -12.7 in the previous month, while French manufacturing climate indicator came in unchanged at 98 in March.
Loans to households in the Eurozone increased 3% to EUR 6.42 trillion for February.
Economics
The US economy expanded by an annualized rate of 4.3% on quarter during the fourth quarter.
US initial jobless claims dropped to 684,000 in the week ended March 20th, below analysts’ expectations of 730,000.
The Energy Information Administration’s weekly report on natural gas stocks in underground storage is scheduled for release at 10:30 a.m. ET.
Federal Reserve Bank of New York President John Williams is set to speak at 10:30 a.m. ET.
The Kansas City Fed's manufacturing for March is scheduled for release at 11:00 a.m. ET. The index is expected to rise to 26 in March from prior reading of 24.
The Treasury is set to auction 4-and 8-week bills at 11:30 a.m. ET.
Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta President Raphael Bostic will speak at 12:00 p.m. ET.
Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago President Charles Evans is set to speak at 1:00 p.m. ET.
The Treasury will auction 7-year notes at 1:00 p.m. ET.
San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank President Mary Daly will speak at 7:00 p.m. ET.
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