Mid-Afternoon Market Update: Gold Gains Over 1%; Luby's Shares Spike Higher

Toward the end of trading Thursday, the Dow traded up 0.02% to 26275.52 while the NASDAQ fell 0.30% to 9653.47. The S&P also fell, dropping 0.26% to 3,114.77.

The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 1,851,520 cases with around 107,170 deaths. Brazil confirmed a total of over 584,010 COVID-19 cases with 32,540 deaths, while Russia reported a total of at least 440,530 confirmed cases and 5,370 deaths. In total, there were at least 6,530,060 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with over 386,390 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Financial shares rose 1.2% on Thursday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Sterling Bancorp, Inc SBT, up 28%, and Invesco Mortgage Capital Inc. IVR, up 26%.

In trading on Thursday, real estate shares fell 2.5%.

Top Headline

J M Smucker Co SJM reported upbeat earnings for its fourth quarter, but issued weak earnings guidance for FY21.

Smucker posted quarterly earnings of $2.57 per share, exceeding analysts’ estimates of $2.29 per share. The company reported sales of $2.09 billion, surpassing the consensus views of $2.06 billion.

Smucker said it expects FY21 adjusted earnings of $7.90 to $8.30 per share, versus analysts’ estimates of $8.43 per share. The company projects net sales to drop 1%-2%.

Equities Trading UP

Kezar Life Sciences, Inc. KZR shares shot up 74% to $7.78 after the company announced updated results from the Phase 1b portion of the Phase 1b/2 MISSION study, which is evaluating the safety and tolerability of KZR-616 in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus with and without nephritis, showing overall improvements across seven measures of disease activity.

Shares of Luby's, Inc. LUB got a boost, shooting 89% to $1.60 after the company reported Q2 results and announced it will pursue a sale of its operations and assets.

Cinedigm Corp. CIDM shares were also up, gaining 162% to $3.4350 after the company announced it has partnered with Vewd for global OTT channel distribution. On Wednesday, Cinedigm reported the launch of The Bob Ross Channel on Roku.

Equities Trading DOWN

Cassava Sciences, Inc. SAVA shares tumbled 20% to $2.73. Cassava Sciences shares jumped around 68% on Wednesday after the company provided updates regarding its Phase 2b Study of PTI-125.

Shares of Smartsheet Inc. SMAR were down 22% to $46.22 after the company issued Q2 guidance below analyst estimates. However, the company reported better-than-expected Q1 earnings.

Summit Wireless Technologies, Inc. WISA was down, falling 19% to $2.32 after the company reported the pricing of $5.8 million registered direct offering.

Commodities


In commodity news, oil traded up 0.1% to $37.33, while gold traded up 1.2% to $1,726.00.

Silver traded up 0.7% Thursday to $18.09, while copper rose 0.1% to $2.49.

Euro zone

European shares closed lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 fell 0.72%, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 0.78%, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index declined 0.04%. Meanwhile, the German DAX 30 dropped 0.45%, French CAC 40 fell 0.21% and UK shares fell 0.64%.

Economics

The US trade deficit increased to $49.4 billion in April versus $42.3 billion in March. Exports fell 20.5%, while imports declined 13.7%.

U.S. initial jobless claims rose 1.877 million in the recent week ended May 30th. However, analysts expected claims to total 1.80 million last week.

Labor productivity dropped by an annualized 0.9% in the first quarter, versus a 1.2% gain in the prior period. Unit labor costs in rose an annualized 5.1% in the first quarter.

Domestic supplies of natural gas gained 102 billion cubic feet for the week ended May 29, the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported. However, analysts projected a rise of 111 billion cubic feet.

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