Category: Stock Market News

North Korea plans to send a delegation that includes athletes to next month’s Winter Olympics in South Korea, according to multiple published reports Tuesday citing Seoul officials. The delegation from the isolated nation also will include cheerleaders, journalists, government officials and other people, an Associated Press report said. The news came as the two countries started their first official face-to-face talks in two years on Tuesday, with hopes that discussions could eventually ease tensions on the peninsula stemming from Pyongyang’s nuclear-weapons program.

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A classified military satellite that blasted off Sunday by Elon Musk’s SpaceX is presumed a total loss after it failed to reach orbit, officials said Monday. While the Falcon 9 rocket launched and landed without incident, the top-secret payload, known as Zuma, apparently didn’t separate as planned from the rocket and plunged back into the atmosphere, Dow Jones Newswires reported late Monday. The failed launch is a major setback for SpaceX, which has been seeking more business from the Pentagon.

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Direxion Asset Management withdrew its request to launch five bitcoin-based exchange-traded funds Monday in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission after regulators voiced their concerns. The filing cited a call with the SEC last week in which “the Staff expressed concerns regarding the liquidity and valuation of the underlying instruments in which the Fund intends to primarily invest and requested that the Trust withdraw the Amendment until such time as these concerns are resolved.” Four of the proposed funds would have been risky derivatives-based leveraged funds, leading one Wall Street analyst to tell CNBC that it “would be insane for them to actually approve this.”

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U.S. stock-market indexes ended mostly higher, with the S&P 500 and Nasdaq scoring their fifth consecutive record close in 2018. But Dow industrials struggled, finishing marginally lower and breaking a four-day advance. Gains were driven by utilities and real estate sectors, usually considered as defensive. The S&P 500 gained 4.55 points, or 0.2%, to 2,747.70. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite index advanced by 20.83 points, or 0.3%, to 7,157.39. The Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 12.94 points, or less than 0.1%, to 25,282.93. Among the best performers on Wall Street, shares of Seagate Technology PLC jumped 7.1%.

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Grammy award-winning pop star The Weeknd, whose real name is Abel Tesfaye, tweeted that he was “shocked and embarrassed” by an H&M Hennes & Mauritz AB ad making the rounds on social media “and will not be working with” the fast-fashion brand any longer. The ad, which H&M has apologized for, features a black child wearing a sweatshirt that says “coolest monkey in the jungle.” H&M has since apologized for the ad and says it has been removed from all channels, according to a CNN report. The Weeknd has collaborated with H&M for two collections. The latest launched in September 2017. H&M shares are down 33.5% in the past year while the S&P 500 index is up 20.6% for the period.

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Shares of Tenet Healthcare Corp. dropped 3.9% in afternoon trade Monday, after the health care services company increased its workforce reduction target by over 50% in an effort to cut more costs. The company said in a presentation at the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco it would cut about 2,000 jobs as it targets an annualized $250 million in cost reductions by the end of 2018. At the Bank of America Merrill Lynch Leverage Finance Conference on Nov. 29, Tenet said it would eliminate 1,300 jobs and targeted cost cuts of $150 million. Separately, the company cut its 2018 adjusted earnings-per-share guidance range to 58 cents to 97 cents from $1.07 to $1.36, because it will no be able to recognize for accounting purposes the future benefit related to excess interest expense limitation carryforward, as a result of the new tax law. The FactSet 2018 adjusted EPS consensus was $1.23. The stock has lost 5.3% over the past three months, while the SPDR Health Care Select Sector ETF has gained 2.4% and the S&P 500 has climbed 7.8%.

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Gold prices settled modestly lower Monday, notching their first decline after a record streak of 11 straight gains. Strength in the U.S. dollar put pressure on dollar-denominated prices for the precious metal. Traders await key readings on U.S. inflation due out later this week for hints on the Federal Reserve’s pace of interest-rate increases this year. February gold fell $1.90, or 0.1%, to settle at $1,320.40 an ounce.

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General Electric Co.’s stock slumped 1.7% in afternoon trade Monday, to be the Dow Jones Industrial Average’s biggest decliner, after J.P. Morgan analyst C. Stephen Tusa cut his price target, saying there were “too many risks” to change his bearish view on the industrial conglomerate. He after taking a “fresh” look into GE’s potential this year, after the stock’s extremely poor relative performance last year, he said the consensus analyst outlook for earnings per share of about $1 is “reasonable,” but remains the “lowest quality $1 of EPS in the sector.” He wrote in a note to clients that the consensus presumption that free cash flow “can grow meaningfully from here banks on working capital remaining positive…, restructuring collapsing…, and an opaque, negative ‘other account,’ including contract assets, getting significantly less negative.” Tusa reiterated his underweight rating, and cut his price target to $16 from $17. The stock had rallied 6.8% amid a 5-session win streak through Friday, the longest such streak since February 2017, and the biggest five-day gain since November 2016. In 2017, the stock had plunged 44.8%, the worst one-year performance since 2008, while the Dow rallied 25.1%.

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Celgene Corp. shares shed 1.9% in active midday trade Monday, after the company released preliminary fourth-quarter and 2017 earnings results, which are expected to beat Wall Street expectations, and its plans for a $1.1 billion upfront acquisition of the biotech Impact Biomedicines. The company also expects revenue of $14.4 billion to $14.8 billion in 2018, compared with the FactSet consensus of $14.8 billion, which could explain the stock decline “as the midpoint would be slightly lighter than consensus,” Mizuho analyst Salim Syed said. Speaking at the J.P. Morgan Health Care Conference in San Francisco on Monday, company management said it had encountered “some choppy weather, let’s say” in 2017 but emphasized its long-term trajectory. Celgene expects to launch 10 potential blockbuster drugs in the next several years, according to a company presentation, naming such therapies as ozanimod, fedratinib, JCAR017 and luspatercept, among others. Celgene shares have dropped 26% over the last three months, compared with a 7.6% rise in the S&P 500 and a 10.9% rise in the Dow Jones Industrial Average .

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Target Corp. said Monday that it will launch its first private label of 2018 next month: Universal Thread, a women’s lifestyle brand focused on denim. The line will include tops, dresses, accessories and shoes at prices ranging from $5 to about $40, which is, on average, up to 10% lower than current items. Sizes will start at 00 and run through 26W, the first time the company has launched a brand with a range of sizes this broad, Mark Tritton, Target’s chief merchandising officer, said in a post on the retailer’s blog. Target announced plans last year to roll out more than a dozen private brands. Among those that have already launched are A New Day and Project 62. Target shares are nearly flat in Monday trading, and up 16.6% for the last three months. The S&P 500 index is up 7.6% for the past three months.

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