Mid-Morning Market Update: Markets Down; US Producer Prices Rise 1% In July

Following the market opening Thursday, the Dow traded down 0.27% to 35,390.70 while the NASDAQ fell 0.29% to 14,722.22. The S&P also fell, dropping 0.17% to 4,440.19.

The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 36,055,270 cases with around 618,130 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 32,036,510 cases and 429,170 deaths, while Brazil reported over 20,212,640 COVID-19 cases with 564,770 deaths. In total, there were at least 204,139,810 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 4,315,870 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Health care shares rose 0.3% on Thursday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included OncoCyte Corporation OCX, up 19% and Doximity, Inc. DOCS up 15%.

In trading on Thursday, energy fell 0.9%.

Top Headline

The Producer Price Index rose 1% for July, following a 1% increase in the previous month. Analysts, however, were expecting for a 0.6% increase in prices.

 

Equities Trading UP

IEC Electronics Corp. IEC shares shot up 47% to $15.26 after the company reported a merger deal with Creation Technologies for $15.35 per share in cash. The company also released Q3 results.

Shares of The ExOne Company XONE got a boost, shooting 40% to $24.14 after Desktop Metal announced it will acquire ExOne. The ExOne also reported better-than-expected Q2 sales results.

Xenetic Biosciences, Inc. XBIO shares were also up, gaining 33% to $4.33 after dipping around 18% on Wednesday.

Check out these big movers of the day

Equities Trading DOWN

MedAvail Holdings, Inc MDVL shares tumbled 52% to $3.57 after the company reported a wider-than-expected Q2 loss.

Shares of LifeStance Health Group, Inc. LFST were down 49% to $11.19 after the company reported Q2 earnings results.

GoHealth, Inc. GOCO was down, falling 35% to $5.31 after the company reported a wider-than-expected Q2 loss. Evercore ISI Group and Credit Suisse downgraded the stock.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded down 0.3% to $69.05, while gold traded down 0.1% to $1,752.10.

Silver traded down 0.4% Thursday to $23.385 while copper rose 0.8% to $4.4020.

Euro zone

European shares were higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 gained 0.1%, the Spanish Ibex Index rose 0.1% and the German DAX 30 gained 0.4%. Meanwhile, the London’s FTSE 100 fell 0.2%, French CAC 40 rose 0.2% and Italy’s FTSE MIB gained 0.3%.

Britain's gross domestic product increased 22.2% year-over-year in the second quarter, while industrial production dropped 0.7% in June. Imports to the UK rose 3.2% to a six-month high of GBP 51.26 billion, while exports declined 1.5% to GBP 48.74 billion in June.

Eurozone industrial production dropped 0.3% in June following a revised 1.1% drop in May. Italy's trade surplus shrank to EUR 5.681 billion in June from EUR 6.228 billion in the year-ago month.

Economics

US initial jobless claims declined to 375,000 in the week ending August 7th.

The Producer Price Index rose 1% for July, following a 1% increase in the previous month. Analysts, however, were expecting for a 0.6% increase in prices.

The Energy Information Administration’s weekly report on natural gas stocks in underground storage will be released at 10:30 a.m. ET.

The Treasury is set to auction 4-and 8-week bills at 11:30 a.m. ET.

The Treasury will auction 30-year bonds at 1:00 p.m. ET.

Check out the full economic calendar here