Mid-Afternoon Market Update: Dow Rises Over 100 Points; Owens & Minor Shares Slide

Toward the end of trading Thursday, the Dow traded up 0.49 percent to 26,277.80 while the NASDAQ climbed 0.35 percent to 7,437.14. The S&P also rose, gaining 0.37 percent to 2,834.37.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Thursday afternoon, the non-cyclical consumer goods & services shares gained by 0.45 percent.

In trading on Thursday, utilities shares tumbled 0.63 percent. Meanwhile, top losers in the sector included SCANA Corporation SCG, down 4 percent, and WEC Energy Group Inc WEC down 2 percent.

Top Headline

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd BABA reported a profit miss in its fiscal third quarter report, but sales did come in above expectations. The company also announced plans to buy a 33 percent stake in Ant Financial.

Alibaba posted quarterly earnings of $1.63 per share in the fourth quarter on revenue of $12.761 billion. However, Wall Street analysts were expecting the company to earn $1.67 per share on revenue of $12.68 billion.

Equities Trading UP

QuinStreet Inc QNST shares shot up 35 percent to $12.56 after reporting a second quarter earnings beat. The company guided FY18 revenues outlook at 20 percent growth.

Shares of Liquidity Services, Inc. LQDT got a boost, shooting up 30 percent to $6.22 after the company posted a narrower-than-expected Q1 loss.

Liquidity Services, Inc. LQDT shares were also up, gaining 30 percent to $6.22 after the company posted a narrower-than-expected Q1 loss.

Equities Trading DOWN

Resolute Forest Products Inc. RFP shares dropped 29 percent to $8.10. Resolute Forest Products reported Q4 net income of $13 million, after posting a loss in the year-ago period. Resolute Forest Products named Yves Laflamme as President and CEO.

Shares of NIC Inc. EGOV were down 20 percent to $13.32. NIC reported Q4 earnings of $0.16 per share.

Owens & Minor, Inc. OMI was down, falling around 18 percent to $17.26 after the company cut its FY17 adjusted earnings outlook. The company now expects FY17 adjusted earnings of $1.58 to $1.61 per share on sales of $9.2 billion to $9.32 billion.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 1.08 percent to $65.43 while gold traded up 0.17 percent to $1,345.40.

Silver traded down 0.67 percent Thursday to $17.125, while copper rose 0.44 percent to $3.2095.

Eurozone

European shares closed mostly lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 declined 0.50 percent, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 0.50 percent, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index climbed 0.15 percent. Meanwhile the German DAX dropped 1.41 percent, and the French CAC 40 fell 0.50 percent while U.K. shares fell 0.57 percent.

Economics

U.S. jobless claims dropped 1,000 to 230,000 in the latest week. However, economists projected claims to reach 240,000 last week.

U.S. nonfarm productivity declined at an annual pace of 0.1 percent for the fourth quarter, versus economists’ expectations for a 0.2 percent gain. Unit-labor costs gained 2 percent for the fourth quarter.

U.S. Markit manufacturing PMI rose to 55.50 for January, versus prior reading of 55.00. However, economists were expecting a reading of 55.50.

U.S. construction spending gained 0.7 percent for December.

The ISM manufacturing index slipped to 59.10 for January, versus previous reading of 59.30. Economists estimated a reading of 58.80.

Domestic supplies of natural gas declined 99 billion cubic feet for the latest week, the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported. Analysts expected a drop of 104 billion cubic feet.

Data on money supply for the recent week will be released at 4:30 p.m. ET.