Category: Stock Market News

Performance Food Group Co. said Wednesday it has priced a secondary offering of 10 million shares at $22.85 a pop. The offering is being underwritten by certain shareholders, including affiliates of The Blackstone Group L.P. and is expected to close on Jan. 13, the company said in a statement. Shares fell 5.4% in premarket trade, but are up about 16% in the last 12 months, while the S&P 500 has gained about 18%.

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Shares of Signet Jewelers are indicated down over 4% in premarket trade Wednesday, after the jewelry retailer cut its fiscal fourth-quarter profit and same-store sales outlook after disappointing holiday-period results. The company now expects adjusted earnings per share for the quarter through January of $4.00 to $4.05, compared with a previous outlook of $4.00 to $4.20. Same-store sales are now expected to decline 4.8% to 4.3%, compared with the previous forecast for a decline of 4.0% to 2.0%. Same-store sales for the nine-weeks ended Dec. 31 fell 4.6%, compared with a 5.1% rise in the same period a year ago. “Signet’s disappointing holiday results were driven principally by underperformance in its Sterling division e-commerce business,” said Chief Executive Mark Light. “Sterling’s challenges in its e-commerce platform were due to recent enhancements that did not perform as expected when exposed to high holiday volume.” The stock has tumbled 31% over the past 12 months through Tuesday, while the SPDR S&P Retail ETF has gained 7.8% and the S&P 500 has climbed 18%.

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Tesla Motors Inc. said Tuesday that it has hired Apple Inc. software veteran Chris Lattner to lead its software efforts in autonomous driving. Lattner was named vice president of Autopilot software, Tesla announced, after working at Apple for 11 years. While at Apple, Lattner helped lead the development of Apple’s Swift programming language for app development. “We are very excited that Chris is joining Tesla to lead our Autopilot engineering team and accelerate the future of autonomous driving,” Tesla said in its blog post. Tesla is using Nvidia Corp. hardware in its attempts to develop autonomous cars, after a falling out with Mobileye NV , but attempting to develop its own software.

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Merck & Co. shares advanced in the extended session Tuesday after the drug maker said the Food and Drug Administration will grant a priority review for one of its lung cancer treatments. Merck shares rose 2.2% to $61.25 after hours, following a 1.9% decline in the regular session. Merck said the FDA accepted its marketing application for Keytruda as a first-line treatment lung cancer along with chemotherapy, with an expected decision date on the application by May 10.

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Dylann Roof was sentenced to death Tuesday in the mass shooting at a Charleston, South Carolina, church that left nine black worshippers dead in June 2015. The jury deliberated only three hours before reaching the unanimous verdict; he had previously been found guilty of the murders in December. During the trial, Roof, a 22-year-old white supremacist, expressed no remorse for the slayings. Roof defended himself during the sentencing phase of the trial, telling jurors he did so to prevent his lawyers from arguing he suffered from psychological problems. “I am not sorry. I have not shed a tear for the innocent people I killed,” he wrote in a jailhouse journal.

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The American Petroleum Institute late Tuesday reported a rise in U.S. crude supplies that was slightly below some market expectations, along with a hefty, unexpected jump in distillate inventories, according to sources. Data revealed a rise of 1.5 million barrels in U.S. crude supplies for the week ended Jan. 6. Analysts polled by S&P Global Platts forecast a climb of 1.75 million barrels. Sources also said gasoline supplies rose by roughly 1.7 million barrels and distillates jumped by a more-than-expected 5.5 million barrels. “A big build in distillate may be because of weather impacting exports last week,” said Price Futures Group’s Phil Flynn. Supply data from the Energy Information Administration will be released Wednesday morning. February crude was at $50.82 a barrel in electronic trading, unchanged from the contract’s settlement on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

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Parsley Energy Inc. shares fell in the extended session Tuesday after the independent oil and natural gas company announced a secondary offering of its shares. Parsley shares fell 4.3% to $35.09 after hours. The company said it plans to offer 20 million shares, with an additional 3 million optional shares to underwriters. Morgan Stanley and BMO Capital Markets are the joint lead bookrunners for the offering. Parsley already has nearly 180 million shares outstanding.

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Ford Motor Co. shares gained slightly in late trading Tuesday after the carmaker announced a special dividend and gave updates on its forecasts. Ahead of a presentation at the Deutsche Bank Global Auto Industry Conference, Ford revealed that it will pay a special dividend of 5 cents a share in the first quarter, along with its regular dividend of 15 cents a share, which is the same as last year’s regular payment. Ford maintained guidance for “somewhat lower” pre-tax profit in 2017 than 2016, due to investments in technology, but said it expected profitability to improve in 2018. Ford said it still expects $10.2 billion in pre-tax profit for 2016, with an adjusted effective tax rate in the low 30% range. Ford stock, which closed with a 1.7% gain at $12.85, rose to $12.93 in late trading.

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Oil futures fell sharply for a second straight session Tuesday, with prices logging their lowest settlement in over a month, pressured by growing concerns over the potential for rising global crude output despite the recent pact among major producers to cut production. February West Texas Intermediate crude fell $1.14, or 2.2%, to settle at $50.82 a barrel–the lowest finish since Dec. 7, according to FactSet data.

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German car maker Volkswagen AG confirmed that it has agreed to pay $4.3 billion in penalties to the U.S. Justice Department and Customs to settle charges that it used special software to cheat on diesel emissions tests, The Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday. The company said its supervisory board must now approve a final deal, which is expected to come later Tuesday or Wednesday. Frankfurt-listed shares closed little changed, but have gained 18% in the last 12 months.

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