Mid-Day Market Update: Crude Oil Down Over 1%; FibroGen Shares Plummet

Midway through trading Wednesday, the Dow traded up 0.02% to 33,437.41 while the NASDAQ rose 0.23% to 13,729.29. The S&P also rose, gaining 0.16% to 4,080.61.

The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 30,847,730 cases with around 556,520 deaths. Brazil reported over 13,100,580 COVID-19 cases with 336,940 deaths, while India confirmed a total of at least 12,801,780 cases and 166,170 deaths. In total, there were at least 132,534,870 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 2,875,870 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Communication services shares rose 0.6% on Wednesday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Snap Inc. SNAP, up 6%, and IZEA Worldwide, Inc. IZEA, up 7%.

In trading on Wednesday, materials shares fell 0.9%.

Top Headline

RPM International Inc. RPM reported better-than-expected earnings for its third quarter.

RPM reported quarterly earnings of $0.38 per share, beating analysts’ estimates of $0.29 per share. The company’s quarterly sales came in at $1.27 billion, versus expectations of $1.21 billion.

 

Equities Trading UP

UTime Limited UTME shares shot up 106% to $80.50. UTime shares jumped 875% on Tuesday after the company priced its IPO at $4 per share.

Shares of Ouster, Inc. OUST got a boost, shooting 15% to $9.06 after Citigroup initiated coverage on the stock with a Buy rating and announced a $17 price target.

SOS Limited SOS shares were also up, gaining 22% to $5.49. A post on a Reddit thread late Tuesday, which has since then been deleted, called upon traders to buy the stock to initiate a short squeeze over the next five trading days.

Check out these big movers of the day

Equities Trading DOWN

FibroGen, Inc. FGEN shares tumbled 38% to $21.33 after a murky disclosure for roxadustat, the company’s anemia treatment in chronic kidney disease patients. While preparing for an advisory committee meeting ahead of potential approval of roxadustat, FibroGen said it realized it submitted altered information to the FDA about the drug’s cardiovascular safety.

Shares of The GEO Group, Inc. GEO were down 20% to $6.22 after the company announced it is suspending its quarterly dividend to 'maximize repayment of debt while it evaluates corporate structure.'

Homology Medicines, Inc. FIXX was down, falling 18% to $7.62 after the company priced its underwritten public offering for proceeds of approximately $50.0 million.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded down 1.4% to $58.52, while gold traded down 0.1% to $1,741.80.

Silver traded up 0.1% Wednesday to $25.24 while copper fell 1.2% to $4.0675.

Euro zone

European shares were mixed today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 fell 0.12%, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 0.41% and the German DAX 30 dropped 0.05%. Meanwhile, the French CAC 40 rose 0.2%, London’s FTSE 100 rose 1.01% and Italy’s FTSE MIB rose 0.01%.

Eurozone composite PMI was revised higher to 53.2 for March versus a preliminary estimate of 52.5, while services PMI rose to 49.6 in March from a preliminary reading of 48.8.

UK services PMI was revised lower to 56.3 in March from a preliminary reading of 56.8. French composite PMI was revised higher to 50 in March versus a preliminary estimate of 49.5, while German composite PMI increased to 57.3 in March from a preliminary reading of 56.8.

Economics

The trade deficit in the US increased to $71.1 billion in February from a revised $67.8 billion in the earlier month.

San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank President Mary Daly will speak at 1:00 p.m. ET.

The Federal Open Market Committee will issue minutes of its latest meeting at 2:00 p.m. ET.

Data on consumer credit for February will be released at 3:00 p.m. ET.

Check out the full economic calendar here