Mid-Afternoon Market Update: Crude Oil Rise; Energy Shares Continue To Climb

Toward the end of trading Tuesday, the Dow traded up 0.34% to 31,564.92 while the NASDAQ fell 0.19% to 14,068.89. The S&P gained 0.11% to 3,939.25.
 

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Energy shares climbed 2.62% on Tuesday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Torchlight Energy Resources, Inc. TRCH, up 68.42%, and US Well Services Inc. USWS, up 27.89 %.

In trading on Tuesday, real estate shares fell 1.35%.
 

Top Headline
HEXO Corp HEXO confirmed plans to acquire Zenabis Global Inc. for $235 million in an all-stock transaction.

Zenabis shareholders will receive 0.01772 of a Hexo share for each Zenabis share. Zenabis’ board of directors has unanimously recommended shareholders to vote in favor of the transaction.
 

Equities Trading UP

• Socket Mobile, Inc. SCKT shares shot up 628.40% to $23.60, driven by heavy volumes after the company unveiled its DuraSled scanner for iPhone 12s.
• ALJ Regional Holdings, Inc. ALJJ was up, rising 39.18% to $1.85, after the company announced its first quarter results, ended December 31, 2020.
• Urban Tea, Inc. MYT shares gained 39.24% to $4.79.

Equities Trading DOWN

• Shares of bluebird bio, Inc. BLUE fell by 36.21% to $29.19. National securities litigation firm Block & Leviton LLP announced that a lawsuit has been filed against bluebird bio and some of its executives for violation of the federal securities laws.
• Neptune Wellness Solutions Inc. NEPT was down, falling 29.55% to $2.48, after the company announced its fiscal third quarter earnings and revenue below expectations.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 1.03% to $60.08, while gold traded down 1.58% to $1,794.40.

Silver traded up 0.21% Tuesday to $27.38, while copper rose 1.28% to $3.83.
 

Euro zone

European shares ended trading mostly lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 fell 0.06%, the German DAX was down 0.32%, Italy’s FTSE MIB Index slipped 0.69%, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 0.61% and UK shares declined 0.11%. Meanwhile, the French CAC 40 closed flat.
 

Economics

The Overall Net Capital Flows data for December will be released at 4:00 p.m. ET. The US recorded a capital and financial account surplus of $214.1 billion November 2020, following an upwardly revised $11.1 billion outflow in October.