Mid-Morning Market Update: Markets Mixed; GameStop Lowers Profit Forecast

Following the market opening Friday, the Dow traded down 0.08 percent to 25,318.82 while the NASDAQ climbed 0.13 percent to 7,282.65. The S&P also rose, gaining 0.11 percent to 2,740.79.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Friday morning, the real estate shares climbed 0.5 percent. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included SITE Centers Corp. SITC up 7 percent, and Brixmor Property Group Inc. BRX up 3 percent.

In trading on Friday, energy shares fell 1 percent.

Top Headline

GameStop Corp. GME reported better-than-expected earnings for its third quarter, but lowered its full-year profit outlook.

GameStop posted quarterly earnings of $0.67 per share on revenues of $2.08 billion. However, analysts were expecting a profit of $0.57 per share on revenue of $2.03 billion.

GameStop said it now projects full-year adjusted profit of $2.55 to $2.75 per share, versus earlier forecast of $3.00 to $3.35 per share. The company expects FY18 total sales to fall 2 percent to 6 percent.

 

Equities Trading UP

Tel-Instrument Electronics Corp. TIK shares got a boost, shooting up 116 percent to $5.30 after the company announced a $816,000 test order from a major US defense contractor.

Shares of Ambarella, Inc. AMBA shot up 13 percent to $38.24 after the company reported better-than-expected results for its third quarter on Thursday.

Workday, Inc. WDAY shares were also up, gaining 11 percent to $161.88 after the company posted upbeat results for its third quarter on Thursday.

Equities Trading DOWN

Yext, Inc. YEXT shares dropped 13 percent to $15.83 following Q3 results. For the current quarter, Yext expects a loss of $0.10 per share to a loss of $0.09 per share, and revenue of $62 million to $63 million.

Shares of Vivint Solar, Inc. VSLR were down 21 percent to $5.52 after the company priced an 8 million share common stock offering at $5.50 per share.

Sprouts Farmers Market, Inc. SFM was down, falling around 15 percent to $22.935 after the company disclosed that its CEO Amin Maredia is leaving the company. Bank of America downgraded Sprouts Farmers Market from Buy to Underperform and lowered the price target from $35 to $21.

 

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded down 1.89 percent to $50.48 while gold traded down 0.23 percent to $1,227.60.

Silver traded down 0.64 percent Friday to $14.31, while copper fell 0.36 percent to $2.7795.

 

Eurozone

European shares were lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 dropped 0.45 percent, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 0.40 percent, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index slipped 0.05 percent. Meanwhile the German DAX dropped 0.56 percent, and the French CAC 40 dipped 0.39 percent while U.K. shares fell 0.82 percent.

Economics

The Chicago PMI rose to 66.40 for November, versus prior reading of 58.40. However, economists projected a reading of 58.60.

The Baker Hughes North American rig count report for the recent week is schedule for release at 1:00 p.m. ET.