Category: Stock Market News

Lennox International Inc. said Wednesday it was raising its quarterly dividend 19%, to 51 cents a share from 43 cents a share. The Dallas-based heating, air conditioning and refrigeration company said the new dividend will be payable July 17 to shareholders of record on June 30. At current stock prices, the new annual dividend rate of $2.04 implies a dividend yield of 1.19%, compared with the S&P 500 implied yield of 2.04%, according to FactSet. Lennox’s stock, which was down 0.5% in afternoon trade, has run up 12% year to date while the S&P 500 has gained 5.6%.

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A steep fall in the Dow Jones Industrial Average on Wednesday was being driven primarily by share declines in Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan Chase. The pair of financial firms’ combined loss on the day was cutting more than 100 points from the blue-chip gauge. Financials were suffering the worst hit in Wednesday’s broad-market downturn. The sector–on promises of deregualation and tax cuts–had been among the best performers following the surprise election of President Donald Trump back in November. Trump’s recent woes, including reports that he allegedly asked the then-director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, James Comey, to halt an investigation into former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, was weighing on investor sentiment. Comey was fired last week amid an investigation Trump officials’, including Flynn’s, ties to Russia during the presidential campaign. The Dow was on track for its worst one-day decline since Sept. 9, while the S&P 500 index and the Nasdaq Composite Index also were on pace for their steepest daily slide since around September. Dow components, Goldman’s stock was down 5.3%, contributing more than 80 points to the Dow’s tumble, while J.P. Morgan Chase & Co.’s share decline was cutting more than 20 points from the equity benchmark.

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Oil prices settled higher Wednesday after the Energy Information Administration reported a fall in U.S. crude inventories–the sixth weekly decline in a row. June West Texas Intermediate crude rose 41 cents, or 0.8%, to settle at $49.07 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It ended at the highest level since April 28, according to FactSet data.

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Time Inc. said Wednesday that it is opening two new stores based on the Southern Living magazine brand. The two stores will be in Destin, FL and Huntsville, AL, and will open in late May, in time for Memorial Day. Time already has one Southern Living store in Myrtle Beach, SC, which opened November 2016. The stores will feature Southern brands like Charleston Tea, Love Cookies, and Merry Cheese Crisps. Time shares are down 3.4% in Wednesday trading, and down 32.6% for the year so far. The S&P 500 index is up 5.7% for 2017 to date.

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The U.S. stock market Wednesday was on pace to log its worst daily decline in eight months, as concerns about President Donald Trump’s FBI controversy weighed on investor sentiment. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 1.5% at 20,670, and at it lows was on pace for its sharpest decline since Sept. 9, 2016, according to FactSet data. The S&P 500 index was off 1.5% at 2,366, on track for its worst daily drop since Sept. 13. Meanwhile, the technology-laden Nasdaq Composite Index was down 2% at 6,045 putting it on pace to post its steepest daily fall since Sept. 9. The downdraft comes on a so-called risk-off day for Wall Street, with haven assets like the 10-year Treasury note [BX: TMUBMUSD10Y] drawing bidders and pushing yields, which move inversely to price, firmly lower. The 10-year Treasury note was off 10 basis points at 2.22%, and gold futures , another flight-to-safety security, settled sharply higher at $1,258.70 an ounce. Weakness came after the New York Times late Tuesday reported that Trump in February asked then-director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, James Comey to stop his investigation into former National Security adviser Michael Flynn. The report cited a memo from Comey. That has raised questions about the president’s ability to implement pro-market policies that have driven stocks to recent records.

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The price of bitcoin jumped to a record high on Wednesday, boosted amid a broad equity selloff and a move to safe haven assets. The price of one bitcoin climbed 6%, according to pricing website CoinDesk, reaching an all-time high of $1,821.21. Thus far in 2017, the popular digital currency is up more than 88%, a rally that has taken its market value to nearly $30 billion. Wednesday’s move came as stock markets around the world tumbled on rising political uncertainty out of the U.S. The CBOE Volatility index surged more than 26%. While bitcoin itself is notoriously volatile, many market participants use it as a tool for diversification, as it has low correlation to other assets classes.

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The ICE U.S. Dollar index , which measures the greenbuck against a basket of six major rivals, on Wednesday fell to its lowest level since Nov. 8 and erased its entire post-election gains. The index is down 0.6% to 97.55 and down 4.6% year to date. The dollar fell sharply against the euro and the yen on Wednesday. One euro bought $1.1150 while the dollar bought ¥111.05. The dollar rallied to a 14-year high after Donald Trump was elected as the 45th U.S. president with investors betting on his pro-growth economic policy and tighter monetary policy from the Federal Reserve. However, the dollar began to lose its luster from mid-December, partly due to softer economic data, lack of concrete steps toward tax reforms and partly due to continued political uncertainty, highlighted by a New York Times story that alleges that Trump asked then-director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, James Comey, to end an investigation into former National Security adviser Michael Flynn back in February, a day after the security adviser resigned. Comey was fired last week as the FBI was investigating ties between Russia and Trump’s presidential campaign.

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Southwest Airlines Co. said Wednesday it raised its quarterly dividend by 25% to 12.5 cents a share from 10 cents a share, and announced a new $2 billion share repurchase program. The new dividend will be payable June 28 to shareholders of record on Jun 7. At current stock prices, the new annual dividend rate implies a dividend yield of 0.87%, below the implied dividend yield for the S&P 500 of 2.04%, according to FactSet. Separately, the air carrier said it launched its new stock buyback program after completing the $2 billion program launched in May 2016, which was completed earlier this month. The stock, which slumped 1.2% in afternoon trade, has soared 15% year to date, which the NYSE Arca Airline Index has ticked up 2.2% and the S&P 500 has gained 6.0%.

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The biggest exchange-traded funds offering low-volatility strategies passed a high-profile test on Wednesday, as they held up relatively well in the face of a broad-market selloff, which saw equity benchmarks suffer the biggest daily drops in months and as volatility spiked. The PowerShares S&P 500 Low Volatility Portfolio fell less than 0.1% on the day while the iShares Edge MSCI Min Vol USA ETF lost 0.2%. The S&P 500 sank 1.3% in its biggest one-day decline since March. The CBOE Volatility Index surged nearly 25% on the day. U.S. stocks were broadly pressured as the latest political turmoil out of Washington weighed on investor sentiment and cast new doubts on whether President Donald Trump would be able to pass his economic agenda. Low-volatility ETFs are designed to deliver broad-market exposure with a bias towards the names that have recently seen the smallest daily moves. Investors use them to limit their downside in periods with steep declines.

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As the Dow Jones Industrial Average slips Wednesday below its 50-day moving average (MA), which many technicians use to define the short-term trend, 17 of its 30 components are also below their respective 50-day MAs. Of that total, shares of Boeing Co. and Merck & Co. Inc. are below their 50-day MAs after closing above them on Tuesday, while UnitedHealth Group Inc.’s stock was above its 50-day MA as recently as Monday. Of that total, Pfizer Inc. , Chevron Corp. , General Electric Co. , Intel Corp. , Verizon Communications Inc. , International Business Machines Corp. , Merck and Procter & Gamble Co. were also below their respective 200-day MAs, which are viewed as dividing lines between longer-term uptrends and downtrends. Exxon Mobil Corp.’s stock was below its 200-day MA, but was still above its 50-day MA. The Dow was down 237 points at 20743, below the 50-day MA at 20,783, but well above the 200-day MA at 19,547.

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