Category: Stock Market News

A U.S. District Court judge in Illinois ordered Igor B. Oystacher and his proprietary trading company, 3Red Trading LLC, both of Chicago, Illinois, to pay a $2.5 million civil penalty for a manipulative and deceptive spoofing scheme he employed while trading at least five different futures contracts on four exchanges for more than two years. The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission charged Oystacher and 3Red with spoofing-entering and canceling orders he never intended to fill-while trading E-Mini S&P 500, copper, crude oil, natural gas, and VIX futures contracts on at least 51 trading days between December 2011 and January 2014. According to the judge’s order this strategy allowed Oystacher and 3Red to buy or sell futures contracts in quantities and/or at price levels that would not have otherwise been available to them in the market, absent the spoofing activity. The judge’s order also requires that an independent monitor assess and monitor all 3Red’s and Oystacher’s futures trading for three years.

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Adam Messinger, Twitter’s chief technology officer, announced on Twitter Tuesday that he is leaving the company. “After 5 years I’ve decided to leave Twitter and take some time off,” Messinger wrote. Twitter said Tuesday that it plans to “streamline and flatten the organization” by having its engineering, product and design function areas reporting directly to Jack Dorsey, the company’s chief executive. These changes come as the company said it is speeding up the implementation of product improvements. Another executive, John McFarland, who joined Twitter when it acquired his startup TellApart, is also leaving the company, according to Recode. Shares of Twitter were down 0.5% after hours.

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The American Petroleum Institute reported late Tuesday a larger than expected drawdown of U.S. crude oil supplies for the week ended Dec. 16. API said U.S. crude supplies declined by just under 4.2 million barrels, according to sources. Analysts and traders forecast a stockpile decline of 2.4 million barrels, on average. Supply data from the Energy Information Administration will be released Wednesday morning. February crude , the most active contract, rose to $53.59 a barrel in electronic trading, up from the contract’s settlement of $52.30 on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

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Facebook is going into radio with the addition of a Live Audio function. The company said Tuesday that the new feature, as part of Facebook Live, would allow publishers to broadcast live recordings. Facebook partnered with the BBC World Service, LBC, Harper Collins and two authors, Adam Grant and Britt Bennett, to test out the feature. It plans to roll it out more broadly in early 2017. Shares of Facebook were down less than 1% after hours Tuesday.

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FedEx Corp earnings came up short of analysts’ expectations Tuesday, and shares declined 3% in late trading. The shipping giant reported net income of $700 million, or $2.59 a share, on sales of $14.9 billion for its fiscal second quarter Tuesday afternoon. After adjustments for costs related to acquisitions, integration and restructuring, FedEx claimed profit of $2.80 a share. Analysts polled by FactSet expected FedEx to report adjusted earnings of $2.91 a share on sales of $14.9 billion. FedEx shares fell below $194 after closing with a 0.6% gain at $198.74.

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Nike Inc. shares surged in the extended session Tuesday after the athletic apparel giant topped Wall Street estimates for the quarter. Nike shares rose 3.5% to $53.61 after hours. The company reported fiscal second-quarter earnings of 50 cents a share on revenue of $8.18 billion. Analysts surveyed by FactSet had forecast earnings of 43 cents a share on revenue of $8.09 billion.

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U.S. stocks finished higher on Tuesday, led by a rally in bank stocks, though the Dow Jones Industrial Average finished just below the psychologically important 20,000 level. Both the Dow and Nasdaq Composite Index closed at fresh all-time highs, with the S&P 500 index falling just short of its own record. The S&P 500 gained 8.23 points, or 0.4%, to 2,270.76, led by financials and consumer-discretionary stocks. The Dow climbed 90.95 points, or 0.5%, to 19,974.14, as Nike Inc. and Goldman Sachs Group led the blue-chip benchmark. The Nasdaq gained 26.50 points, or 0.5%, to 5,483.94.

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WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — The Federal Reserve on Tuesday extended the comment period on its plan to make it more difficult for banks to be involved in physical commodities. Under the proposal, firms would have to hold more capital, not be able to engage in activities involving power plants and not be allowed to own or store copper. Comments are now due on Feb. 20 rather than later this week. The Fed said more time was needed so that interested parties could analyze the issues.

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Crude-oil prices finished higher Tuesday, and futures scored a third positive session of gains in a row, ahead of weekly supply updates on crude inventories in the U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude oil for February delivery , the most active contract, finished at 24 cents, or 0.5%, higher at $53.30 a barrel, while the January contract , which expired Tuesday, settled up 11 cents, or 0.2%, at $52.23 a barrel. A weekly U.S. supply update is due from the trade industry group American Petroleum Institute at 4:30 p.m. Eastern on Tuesday and on Wednesday weekly inventory data by the U.S. Energy Information Administration will be released at 10.30 a.m. Eastern. Both reports are likely to be influential to crude-oil futures, which have traded in a relatively narrow, albeit positive, range since the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and other major oil producers forged a pact to cut production. Fears that producers will not adhere to those production limits has caused oil futures to experience volatile trade.

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Shares of Fifth Third Bancorp rallied 2% in afternoon trade Tuesday, after the bank said it was increasing its dividend by 8%. The new quarterly dividend of 14 cents a share, up from 13 cents a share, will be payable Jan. 17 to shareholders of record on Dec. 30. Based on the stock’s current price of $27.77, the new annual dividend rate of 56 cents a share represents a dividend yield of 2.02%, compared with the yield of 1.97% for the SPDR Financial Select Sector ETF and the aggregate dividend yield for the S&P 500 of 2.08%, according to FactSet. The stock has run up 38% year to date, while the financial ETF has climbed 22% and the S&P 500 has gained 11%.

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