Category: Stock Market News

Daily fantasy sports companies FanDuel Inc. and DraftKings Inc. are in talks to merge, according to a Bloomberg report that cited people familiar with the conversations. The privately held companies have been battling regulators this year, who claim the sites are tantamount to gambling, and in March agreed to bar New York state residents from their sites as part of a deal with the state’s attorney general’s office.

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The iPath S&P 500 VIX Short-term Futures ETN shot up 14.80% in active trade Monday, the biggest one-day gain of 2016, to extend its win streak to five sessions. That’s the longest win streak for the measure of stock market volatility (VXX), which tends to rise when stocks fall, since the six-session streak ending Feb. 11, 2016. That was the day the S&P 500 closed at a 22-month low of 1,829.08. The VXX’s gain was the biggest since it climbed 14.99% o Dec. 11, 2015. Volume of 124.5 million shares on Monday, which was nearly double the full-day average, made it the most active stock traded on U.S. exchanges. The VXX has run up 28% during its win streak; the S&P 500 has declined for three-straight sessions, and has lost 1.4% during the VXX’s losing streak.

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Oil production from seven major U.S. shale plays is expected to fall by 118,000 barrels a day to 4.72 million barrels a day in July from June, according to a monthly report from the Energy Information Administration released Monday. Oil output at the Eagle Ford shale play in South Texas is expected to see the largest decline, down 63,000 barrels in July. The Bakken shale play, which stretches from Canada into North Dakota and Montana, is expected to see output fall by 32,000 barrels a day, the report said. July oil traded at $48.84 a barrel in electronic trading, after settling at $48.88, down 19 cents, on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

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Moody’s Investors Service said Monday that it was reviewing Microsoft Corp.’s triple-A rating (Aaa) for a possible downgrade, following the technology giant’s bid to buy LinkedIn Corp. for $26.2 billion. Microsoft’s short-term rating was affirmed at Prime-1, and is not currently under review. Moody’s said although buying LinkedIn could provide meaningful benefits to Microsoft’s cloud-based services platform, the rating agency said funding the acquisition entirely with debt will increase gross debt to 2.0 times earnings before taxes depreciation and amortization (EBITDA), a measure of cash flow. It would also increase leverage to more than the 1.5 times that Moody’s had previously said could put pressure on the technology company’s ratings. If Microsoft’s rating is lowered, Johnson and Johnson would become the only company that Moody’s rates with a Aaa rating. The stock slumped 2.4% in afternoon trade, while LinkedIn’s stock shot up 47%. Year to date, shares of Microsoft have lost 9.4%, LinkedIn gave 15% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average has tacked 2.2%.

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​The CBOE Market Volatility Index on Monday climbed above the 18-mark for the first time since March 10 on uncertainties ahead of the Federal Reserve monetary policy meeting and the looming vote on whether U.K. will remain in the European Union. The Vix, the so-called fear gauge, added 1.47 points, or 8.6%, to 18.48 in recent activity. Most major stock markets declined with the Stoxx Europe 600 down more than 1% while Japan’s Nikkei tumbled 3.5%. The S&P 500 was off 0.3% to 2,091, the Dow Jones Industrial Average slid 0.2% to 17,833 and the Nasdaq was down 0.4% to 4,873.

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MGT Capital Investments , the company now headed by cybersecurity veteran John McAfee, said Monday it has hired a first hacker for its newly-formed Hacker Advisory Board. The company said last week it would create the special board to fight hackers, citing the statement from the designer of the first bank vault, Alexandre Fichet, that “no one unschooled in the art of picking locks can design and build a decent safe,” as its rationale. The company has hired ethical hacker Bryan Seely to the board with immediate effect. Seely, a former U.S. Marine, is known for his ethical hacking, in which he hacks sites to show companies and the U.S. government where there are vulnerabilities. Seely “thinks entirely out of the box, and has consistently looked to leverage his skills for the good of society,” McAfee said in a statement. MGT is planning to acquire a portfolio of cybersecurity technologies. Shares rose 2.9% in Monday trade.

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From:: Stock Market News

MGT Capital Investments , the company now headed by cybersecurity veteran John McAfee, said Monday it has hired a first hacker for its newly-formed Hacker Advisory Board. The company said last week it would create the special board to fight hackers, citing the statement from the designer of the first bank vault, Alexandre Fichet, that “no one unschooled in the art of picking locks can design and build a decent safe,” as its rationale. The company has hired ethical hacker Bryan Seely to the board with immediate effect. Seely, a former U.S. Marine, is known for his ethical hacking, in which he hacks sites to show companies and the U.S. government where there are vulnerabilities. Seely “thinks entirely out of the box, and has consistently looked to leverage his skills for the good of society,” McAfee said in a statement. MGT is planning to acquire a portfolio of cybersecurity technologies. Shares rose 2.9% in Monday trade.

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The Supreme Court has struck down a Puerto Rican law that would have allowed the U.S. territory’s public utilities to restructure their debt. The 5-2 ruling leaves management of the island’s fiscal crisis to Congress. The House of Representatives passed a bill last week to help Puerto Rico manage its debt crisis. The Senate has not yet acted.

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McDonald’s Corp. announced Monday plans to move its corporate headquarters to downtown Chicago by the spring of 2018. The lease it signed at 1045 W. Randolph St. in Chicago is about 18 miles west of the current headquarters, as 2111 McDonalds Dr., Oak Brook, Ill., according to Google Maps. “Today’s announcement is about more than just a new location for us,” said Chairman Rick Hernandez in a statement. “It is an important investment in our people as we look to create a start-of-the-art company headquarters they can use to move our business forward for many years to come.” McDonald’s had been headquartered in Chicago between 1955 from 1971. The headquarters will also be the location for Hamburger University, which the company uses to train its future leaders. The stock, which rose 0.7% in morning trade, has gained 4.4% year to date, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average has tacked on 2.5%.

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