Category: Stock Market News

Shares in Italy’s Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena SpA rose as much 17% to 0.31 euros (34 U.S. cents0 on Wednesday following a temporary halt in short-selling of the stock. Italian securities regulator Consob banned short-selling of shares in Italy’s third-largest lender through Wednesday. The move came as BMPS shares this week hit all-time lows as the European Central Bank pushes the company to reduce the amount of nonperforming loans on its books. This year, the shares have lost nearly 77%.

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Shares of National Interstate Corp. surged 3.7% in premarket trade Wednesday, after American Financial Group Inc. raised its buyout bid for the Ohio-based insurance holding company by 6.7% to $32 a share. The previous bid of $30 a share was announced on March 7. American Financial said the new bid represents its “best and final offer,” and that it remains confident that a special committee formed to review the bid will approve a deal. Based on National Interstate’s 19.93 million shares outstanding, according to FactSet, the new bid would value the insurer at about $637.8 million. National Interstate’s stock hasn’t traded as high as $32 since July 30, 2013. It had run up 13% year to date through Tuesday, while American Financial shares had ticked up 0.1% and the S&P 500 had gained 2.2%.

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Netflix Inc. shares slid more than 3.1% in premarket trade after analysts at Jefferies downgraded the stock to underperform from hold. Lead analyst John Janedis wrote in a note to clients he worries Netflix’s slowing U.S. market will put pressure on the stock’s multiple. “Although [Netflix’s] runway will span multiple years, our research suggests the domestic subscriber growth trajectory may be somewhat flatter than the market’s current expectations,” Janedis wrote. Netflix’s first mover advantage is now eroding with the growth of platforms such as Amazon Inc.’s Prime Instant Video and Hulu — a joint venture by Walt Disney Co. , 21st Century Fox Inc. and Comcast Corp. . Netflix has been investing large sums in its international business, but Janedis views growth in merging markets as more challenging than expected due to established players and cultural and language barriers. “Overall we believe that subscriber growth and free cash flow generation over the long-term will grow more slowly than the consensus view as [Netflix] acquires more expensive global rights to content, in addition to investing significantly in original programming,” he wrote. Shares of Netflix are down 14.4% in the year to date, underperforming the S&P 500 Index, which is up 2.2%.

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Shares of Anheuser-Busch InBev N.V. dropped 1.7% in premarket trade Wednesday, after RBC Capital turned bearish on the beer and beverage giant, citing concerns over the SABMiller PLC acquisition. Analyst James Edwardes Jones cut his rating to underperform from sector perform. Jones said he believes Anheuser-Busch will deliver on the synergies it has targeted from the SABMiller deal, and more, but he expects all the benefits will be realized by SABMiller’s shareholders, not Anheuser-Busch’s. “Thus while we expect it to do its normal awesome job in extracting synergies from SABMiller, we do not expect significant margin accretion over and above that, as we don’t believe [Anheuser-Busch’s] competitive position will have been materially enhanced,” Jones wrote in a note to clients. “We believe those ‘normal’ synergies are fully anticipated by investors.” The stock has gained 2.9% year to date through Tuesday, while the S&P 500 has advanced 2.2%.

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Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc. reported Wednesday fiscal third-quarter earnings that declined to $1.1 billion, or $1.01 a share, from $1.3 billion, or $1.18 a share, in the same period a year ago. Excluding non-recurring items, earnings per share increased 16% to $1.18, beating the FactSet consensus of $1.14. Revenue rose 2.4% to $29.5 billion from $28.8 billion, but fell shy of the FactSet consensus of $29.7 billion, as 3.7% growth in domestic retail pharmacy sales helped offset a 2.3% decline in international sales. Looking ahead, the drug store chain, which is in the process of acquiring Rite Aid Corp. , raised its EPS outlook to a range of $3.45 to $3.55 from $3.35 to $3.55. The company said it still expects the Rite Aid deal to close in the second half of 2016. “We delivered solid results in the quarter while continuing to make progress in several key areas, including our work to develop long-term strategic relationships and pursue partnership opportunities,” said Chief Executive Stefano Pessina. The stock, which was still inactive in premarket trade, has lost 1.9% year to date, while the S&P 500 has gained 2.2%.

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Barcelona FC and Argentina striker Lionel Messi has been sentenced to 21 months in prison for tax evasion, but he is unlikely to spend any time behind bars, according to media reports. His father, Jorge Messi, was also sentenced to 21 months of prison time for defrauding Spain 4.1 million euros ($4.54 million) in taxes between 2007 and 2009. However, under Spanish law any sentence under two years can be served under probation, so the Barcelona player is unlikely to go to prison, according to the reports. Messi said during the trial he “knew nothing” about his tax affairs and was just “playing football”.

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Sweden’s central bank on Wednesday kept its key interest rate at negative 0.5% and said the uncertainty over the U.K.’s Brexit has delayed future rate hikes. The Riksbank said in a statement that the Swedish economy continues to strengthen, but that there is “considerable” uncertainty” over developments abroad. This uncertainty has increased as a result of the U.K. decision last month to leave the European Union, the bank said. “A highly expansionary monetary policy is needed to provide support to the Swedish economy and rising inflation,” the bank said. “There is still a high level of preparedness to make monetary policy more expansionary if this is needed to safeguard the inflation target.” The Riksbank said government-bond purchases will continue during the second half of 2016, as was decided in April. The Swedish krona rose after the announcement, with the dollar buying 8.5085 kronor, compared with 8.5254 late Tuesday in New York.

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Medivation Inc. said Tuesday that an acquisition bid of $58 a share from Sanofi SA had been rejected by its board of directors, and that the San Francisco biotech has agreed to explore a potential sale to multiple parties. Sanofi is one of an unstated number of companies that has signed a confidentiality agreement with Medivation in order to review non-public information on the company, which develops drugs mostly for cancers that are hard to treat. Sanofi sought to replace the board of Medivation after it rejected previous bids from the French pharmaceutical giant. Pfizer Inc. has also been reportedly interested in acquiring the company, but the news release did not list other potential suitors beyond Sanofi. “Our board remains committed to objectively considering all avenues that may enhance our ability to deliver superior value,” Medivation board chairman Kim Blickenstaff said in an announcement Monday. Medivation shares gained about 1.5% in late trading Monday, after closing with a 2.7% gain at $61.76; the company’s stock is up nearly 28% on the year.

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From:: Stock Market News

Stocks sagged Tuesday as Brexit-related uncertainties spooked investors. The Dow Jones Industrial Average declined 108 points, or 0.6%, at 17,840. Shares of J.P. Morgan Chase finished 2.8% lower, leading the blue-chip benchmark in its descent, as bank stocks came under trading pressure. The S&P 500 gave up 14 points, or 0.7%, to 2,088 and the Nasdaq Composite Index declined 39 points, or 0.8%, at 4,822. A nearly 5% decline in crude-oil prices to below $47 a barrel, which contributed to the market’s decline, putting pressure on energy-related stocks. Trading action was marked by records lows in benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury yields , which fell to around 1.36% and a fresh 31-year record low for the British pound against the U.S. dollar in the wake of its decision to exit the European Union, dubbed Brexit. U.S. markets were closed Monday in observance of Independence Day.

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Bret Taylor, former chief technology officer at Facebook Inc. , has joined Twitter Inc.’s board of directors, the company said Tuesday. Taylor, who is currently the chief executive of Quip, a productivity company, also previously worked at Alphabet Inc. , where he was the co-creator of Google Maps. “Bret brings to our board a great mind for consumer products and technologies that will be invaluable to the company as we execute our plans for 2016 and beyond,” Omid Kordestani, Twitter’s executive chairman, said in a release.

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