Nasdaq Dips 300 Points; Kraft Heinz Posts Upbeat Earnings

U.S. stocks traded lower toward the end of trading, with the Nasdaq Composite falling over 300 points on Wednesday. Fitch Ratings downgraded the United States’ sovereign credit grade from AAA to AA+.

The Dow traded down 0.82% to 35,339.52 while the NASDAQ fell 2.11% to 13,982.50. The S&P 500, also fell, dropping, 1.27% to 4,518.43.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

• Consumer staples shares climbed by 0.5% on Wednesday.
• In trading on Wednesday, information technology shares fell by 2.5%.

 

Top Headline

The Kraft Heinz Company KHC reported better-than-expected earnings for its second quarter, while sales missed estimates.

The company reported second-quarter FY23 sales growth of 2.6%, year-on-year, to $6.72 billion, missing the analyst consensus of $6.81 billion. Adjusted EPS of $0.79 beat the analyst consensus of $0.74.

 

Equities Trading UP

• WaveDancer, Inc. WAVD shares shot up 109% to $0.62. Tellenger, a subsidiary of Wavedancer, Inc., won a seven-year U.S. government contract.
• Shares of T Stamp Inc. IDAI got a boost, shooting 73% to $2.5118. Trust Stamp received privacy-secured biometric identification and verification patent.
• Vertiv Holdings Co VRT shares were also up, gaining 29% to $34.34 after the company posted upbeat quarterly results and raised revenue forecast.

 

Equities Trading DOWN

• Adamis Pharmaceuticals Corporation ADMP shares dropped 64% to $1.4234 after the company reported pricing of $8 million public offering of 5.93 million units at a price of $1.35 per unit.
• Shares of Cambium Networks Corporation CMBM were down 29% to $11.51 after the company reported worse-than-expected second-quarter results.
• Driven Brands Holdings Inc. DRVN was down, falling 43% to $14.90 after the company reported worse-than-expected second-quarter adjusted EPS results and issued FY23 guidance below estimates.

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Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded down 2.7% to $79.19 while gold traded down 0.3% at $1,973.10.

Silver traded down 1.9% to $23.865 on Wednesday while copper fell 1.6% to $3.8455.

 

Euro zone

European shares closed lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 fell 1.35%, London’s FTSE 100 fell 1.36% while Spain’s IBEX 35 Index fell 1.83% The German DAX declined 1.36% French CAC 40 fell 1.26% and Italy’s FTSE MIB Index declined 1.30%.

The number of foreign tourist arrivals in Spain rose 10.9% year-over-year to 8.3 million in June, while number of people registering as jobless in the country declined 0.4% to 2.68 million in July.

 

Asia Pacific Markets

Asian markets closed lower on Wednesday, with Japan’s Nikkei 225 falling 2.3%, China’s Shanghai Composite Index falling 0.89% and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index falling 2.47%. India’s S&P BSE Sensex, meanwhile, fell 1.02%.

The Ai Group Australian Industry Index declined by 2.8 points to -14.7 in July.

 

Economics

• Mortgage applications in the U.S. declined 3% in the final week of July, versus a 1.8% decline in the prior period.
• Private businesses in the U.S. added 324 thousand workers in July versus a revised 455 thousand rise and surpassing market estimates of a 189 thousand increase.
• U.S. crude oil inventories fell by 17.049 million barrels in the final week of July, notching the biggest decline since records began in 1982, and higher than market estimates of a 1.367 million decline, the Energy Information Administration said.

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COVID-19 Update

The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 107,515,730 cases with around 1,169,810 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 44,995,620 cases and 531,910 deaths, while France reported over 40,138,560 COVID-19 cases with 167,640 deaths. In total, there were at least 692,531,690 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 6,903,480 deaths.