Mid-Afternoon Market Update: S&P 500 Turns Positive; Aptinyx Shares Slide

U.S. stocks pared losses, with the Dow Jones and S&P 500 turning positive toward the end of trading on Thursday.

The Dow traded up 0.01% to 34,499.85 while the NASDAQ fell 0.30% to 34,512.31. The S&P also rose, gaining, 0.12% to 4,486.59.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

Health care shares jumped by 1.9% on Thursday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Werewolf Therapeutics, Inc. HOWL, up 28% and Ikena Oncology, Inc. IKNA up 31%.

In trading on Thursday, real estate shares fell 1.1%.

Top Headline

US initial jobless claims fell by 5 thousand to 166 thousand in the week ended April 2nd. However, analysts were expecting a reading of 200 thousand.

Equities Trading UP

Momentus Inc. MNTS shares shot up 40% to $4.12 as the company signed multiple launch agreements with Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX), a Tesla CEO Elon Musk-led company.

Shares of Werewolf Therapeutics, Inc. HOWL got a boost, shooting 30% to $6.13 after the company and Jazz Pharmaceuticals announced an exclusive global license and collaboration agreement to develop WTX-613, a differentiated, conditionally-activated IFNα INDUKINE molecule.

MedAvail Holdings, Inc. MDVL shares were also up, gaining 52% to $1.3007. Ally Bridge Group reported a purchase of 21.176 million shares of MedAvail Holdings for an average price of $1.06 per share.

Equities Trading DOWN

Aptinyx Inc. APTX shares tumbled 50% to $1.16 after the company reported results from its Phase 2b study of NYX-2925 in painful diabetic peripheral neuropathy. The company reported NYX-2925 did not achieve the primary endpoint of the study.

Shares of Rite Aid Corporation RAD were down 22% to $6.58 after Deutsche Bank downgraded the stock from Hold to Sell and lowered its price target from $16 to $1.

Vapotherm, Inc. VAPO was down, falling 33% to $8.61 after the company announced the withdrawal of FY22 guidance and issued Q1 sales guidance below analyst estimates.

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Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded down 1.1% to $95.21, while gold traded up 0.8% to $1,938.40.

Silver traded up 0.8% Thursday to $24.66 while copper fell 0.6% to $4.7095.

Euro zone

European shares were lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 fell 0.21%, London’s FTSE 100 fell 0.47%, while Spain’s IBEX 35 Index fell 0.17%. The German DAX dropped 0.52%, French CAC 40 fell 0.57% and Italy’s FTSE MIB Index fell 0.59%.

Retail sales in the Eurozone rose 0.3% from a month ago in February following a 0.2% increase in January. Industrial production in Germany rose 0.2% from a month ago in February, versus a revised 1.4% increase in January.

The Halifax house price index in the UK rose 11% year-over-year in March, while labor productivity in the country rose 1.3% on quarter during the last three months of 2021.

Economics

US initial jobless claims fell by 5 thousand to 166 thousand in the week ended April 2nd. However, analysts were expecting a reading of 200 thousand.

US natural gas supplies dropped 33 billion cubic feet last week, the Energy Information Administration said.

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

Federal Reserve Bank of New York President John Williams is set to speak at 4:05 p.m. ET.

COVID-19 Update

The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 81,950,240 cases with around 1,010,530 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 43,031,950 cases and 521,560 deaths, while Brazil reported over 30,067,240 COVID-19 cases with 660,780 deaths. In total, there were at least 495,503,030 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 6,192,340 deaths.