Mid-Afternoon Market Update: Dow Turns Negative; SmileDirectClub Shares Fall On Downbeat Q4 Results

Toward the end of trading Wednesday, the Dow traded down 0.44% to 26961.81 while the NASDAQ rose 0.12% to 8976.54. The S&P also fell, dropping 0.26% to 3120.09.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Information technology shares climbed 0.7% on Wednesday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Opera Limited OPRA, up 13%, and Cloudflare, Inc. NET, up 9%.

In trading on Wednesday, energy shares fell 2.3%.

Top Headline

Lowe's Companies, Inc. LOW reported stronger-than-expected earnings for its fourth quarter, while sales missed views. The company also issued weak earnings outlook for FY20.

Lowe's reported quarterly earnings of $0.94 per share, which beat the analyst consensus estimate of $0.91. The company reported quarterly sales of $16.03 billion, which missed the analyst consensus estimate of $16.17 billion.

Lowe's said it expects FY20 adjusted earnings of $6.45 to $6.65 per share, versus analysts’ estimates of $6.67 per share.

Equities Trading UP

SELLAS Life Sciences Group, Inc. SLS shares shot up 29% to $2.67 after the company reported follow-up Phase 1/2 clinical data for Galinpepimut-S in acute myeloid leukemia.

Shares of Alpha Pro Tech, Ltd APT got a boost, shooting 24% to $12.38 after surging 40% on Tuesday. Alpha Pro Tech expects 'higher than normal' gross margin in Q1 as a result of the Coronavirus.

Tonix Pharmaceuticals Holding Corp. TNXP shares were also up, gaining 160% to $1.05 after the company announced a strategic collaboration with Southern Research to support development of a vaccine, codenamed TNX-1800, a live modified horsepox virus vaccine for percutaneous administration, to protect against COVID-19.

Equities Trading DOWN

Aptorum Group Limited APM shares tumbled 51% to $7.00 after the company reported the pricing of $10 million registered direct offering.

Shares of SmileDirectClub, Inc. SDC were down 30% to $7.97 after the company reported worse-than-expected Q4 results. Jefferies downgraded SmileDirectClub from Buy to Hold and lowered the price target from $22 to $10.

Menlo Therapeutics Inc. MNLO was down, falling 32% to $2.9950. Menlo Therapeutics said its Phase 2 study of serlopitant for the treatment of chronic pruritus of unknown origin did not meet the primary endpoint of showing a statistically significant reduction in pruritus in patients treated with serlopitant compared to placebo based upon a 4-point improvement responder analysis.

Commodities


In commodity news, oil traded down 2.2% to $48.78, while gold traded down 0.1% to $1,647.80.

Silver traded down 1.5% Wednesday to $17.915, while copper fell 0.4% to $2.568.

Euro zone

European shares closed mostly higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 rose 0.01% the Spanish Ibex Index gained 0.71%, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index gained 1.44% Meanwhile, the German DAX dropped 0.12%, and the French CAC 40 rose 0.09% while UK shares rose 0.35%.

Economics

New home sales rose 7.9% to an annual rate of 764,000 in January.

U.S. crude supplies rose 500,000 barrels for the week ended February 21, the Energy Information Administration reported. However, analysts expected a gain of 2.8 million barrels. Gasoline supplies fell 2.7 million barrels, while distillate supplies declined 2.1 million barrels for the week.