Mid-Morning Market Update: Markets Mixed; UK Terminates Valneva's COVID-19 Vaccine Contract

Following the market opening Monday, the Dow traded up 0.61% to 34,817.26 while the NASDAQ fell 0.40% to 15,055.69. The S&P also rose, gaining 0.05% to 4,460.84.

The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 40,955,260 cases with around 659,970 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 33,264,170 cases and 442,870 deaths, while Brazil reported over 20,999,770 COVID-19 cases with 586,850 deaths. In total, there were at least 224,677,810 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 4,630,890 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Energy shares gained 3.2% on Monday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Uranium Royalty Corp. UROY, up 23% and Ur-Energy Inc. URG up 12%.

In trading on Monday, health care shares fell by 0.7%.

Top Headline

The U.K. government has terminated its COVID-19 vaccine contract with Valneva SE VALN over alleged breach of obligations.

Britain has ordered 100 million doses of Valneva's vaccine candidate, VLA2001, and had an option to secure an additional 90 million doses. The total value of these 190 million doses is around €1.4 billion.

Equities Trading UP

Itamar Medical Ltd. ITMR shares shot up 45% to $30.11. ZOLL Medical Corporation, an Asahi Kasei company, agreed to acquire Itamar Medical for a total value of approximately $538 million.

Shares of Aterian, Inc. ATER got a boost, shooting 45% to $17.12. Investor presentation released on Friday is now circulating on news outlets.

iRhythm Technologies, Inc. IRTC shares were also up, gaining 31% to $63.33. iRhythm Technologies named Quentin Blackford as President and Chief Executive Officer.

Check out these big movers of the day

Equities Trading DOWN

MiMedx Group, Inc. MDXG shares tumbled 59% to $6.38 after announcing top-line results from two musculoskeletal trials of micronized dehydrated Human Amnion Chorion Membrane (mdHACM). Top-line results from an interim analysis of the six-month efficacy data for the Phase 2B trial for Knee Osteoarthritis (KOA) did not meet primary endpoints.

Shares of Valneva SE VALN were down 40% to $28.19 after the company announced it received a termination notice from the UK Government in relation to the Supply Agreement for its COVID-19 vaccine candidate, VLA2001.

Silverback Therapeutics, Inc. SBTX was down, falling 26% to $14.21. Silvermack Therapeutics will present data from Phase 1/1b clinical trial of SBT6050 at the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) 2021 Congress.

 

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 1% to $70.44, while gold traded down 0.1% to $1,790.90.

Silver traded down 0.8% Monday to $23.715 while copper fell 0.4% to $4.4350.

Euro zone

European shares were higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 surged 0.4%, the Spanish Ibex Index rose 0.6% and the German DAX 30 climbed 0.7%. Meanwhile, the London’s FTSE 100 rose 0.5%, French CAC 40 gained 0.4% and Italy’s FTSE MIB rose 0.6%.

Wholesale prices in Germany surged 12.3% year-over-year in August, recording the highest rate since October 1974.

Economics

The Treasury is set to auction 3-and 6-month bills at 11:30 a.m. ET.

The U.S. Treasury budget statement for August will be released at 2:00 p.m. ET.

Check out the full economic calendar here