Tag: stock market

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) – Financial conditions are much tighter now than they were when the Federal Reserve hiked rates in December, and if they persist into March, the U.S. central bank will have to take that into account, said New York Fed President William Dudley on Wednesday. “One thing I think we can say with more confidence is that financial conditions are considerably tighter than they were at the time of the December meeting,” Dudley said in an interview with Market News International. He said he thought the Fed’s statement after its last meeting was an acknowledgment that “things have happened in financial markets and in the flow of economic data that may be in the process of altering the outlook for growth and the risk to the outlook for growth going forward.” He added it was still “a little soon to draw any firm conclusions from what we’ve seen.”

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Autodesk Inc. said Wednesday it will terminate 925 employees, or about 10% of its workforce, as part of a corporate restructuring disclosed in a regulatory filing. The design software company said it expects to complete the job cuts by the end of January 2017. Restructuring charges are expected to be $85 million to $95 million, of which $77 million to $85 million would be for employee termination benefits. “The company is taking these actions to accelerate its move to the cloud and its transition to a subscription-based business model,” the company stated in the filing. The company said it expects fiscal fourth-quarter adjusted earnings per share to be at the high end or exceed its previously-provided expected range of 8 cents to 12 cents, compared with the FactSet EPS consensus of 10 cents. The stock, which was still inactive in premarket trade, has tumbled 21% over the past three months, while the S&P 500 has lost 9.8%.

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WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — Sen. Rand Paul will drop out of the race for president, Politico reported, citing three sources close to the campaign. CNN also said Paul is suspending his campaign. The Kentucky Republican with libertarian leanings has struggled in polls and finished fifth in the Iowa caucus.

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WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) – The Treasury Department said Wednesday it will “modestly reduce” the size of note and bond offerings over the next three months in order to ramp up sales of Treasury bills. Treasury said it will reduce its coupon offerings by $12 billion over the upcoming quarter. Treasury said it also will trim the offering sizes of its inflation-protected securities over the next quarter. The announcement came as the department laid out details of its quarterly refunding auctions. Treasury will sell $62 billion in notes and bonds next week. The department will auction $24 billion in 3-year notes on Feb. 9 and $23 billion in 10-year notes on Feb. 10. The government will also sell $15 billion in 30-year bonds on Feb. 11. The offering will refund $54.4 billion in maturing securities and raise approximately $7.6 billion.

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Wells Fargo & Co. said Wednesday it agreed to pay $1.2 billion to resolve certain civil claims government regulators had pending against the company. The claims were related to the bank’s Federal Housing Administration lending program from 2001 through 2010, and other potential civil claims. As a result of the payment, Wells Fargo said it reduced its 2015 earnings by $134 million, or 3 cents a share. “Although the company and the Federal Government have reached an agreement in principle to resolve these matters, there can be no assurance that the company and the Federal Government will agree on the final documentation of the settlement,” Wells Fargo stated in a regulatory filing. The stock, which tacked on 0.5% in premarket trade, has dropped 9.4% over the past year, while the S&P 500 has lost 7.2%.

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WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) – Private-sector employment gains increased in January but at a slower pace than in the prior month, according to a report released Wednesday. Employers added 205,000 jobs in January, according to Automatic Data Processing Inc. ADP tweaked December’s gain to 267,000 from a prior estimate of 257,000. Economists use ADP’s data to get a feeling for the Labor Department’s employment report, which will be released Friday and covers government jobs in addition to the private sector. Economists polled by MarketWatch expect the government’s report to show that nonfarm payroll rose by 180,000 jobs last month, down from the torrid pace of 292,000 in December.

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Mondelez International Inc. reported on Wednesday a fourth-quarter loss of $729 million, or 46 cents a share, compared with a profit of $500 million, or 29 cents a share, in the same period a year ago. Excluding non-recurring items, such as a one-time accounting charge of $778 million to remove its Venezuelan operations from its balance sheet, adjusted earnings per share came to 46 cents, below the FactSet consensus of 48 cents. Revenue fell 17% to $7.36 billion, but beat the FactSet consensus of $7.27 billion. Unfavorable currency movements reduced revenue by 11 percentage points. For 2016, the snacking giant said adjusted EPS is expected to grow at a double-digit percentage rate on a constant currency basis, with currency translation expected to reduce EPS by about 13 cents. The FactSet consensus for 2016 EPS is $1.99. “In 2015, we delivered another year of very strong results despite the highly volatile macroeconomic environment,” said Chief Executive Irene Rosenfeld. “Our aggressive cost-savings programs drove significant margin expansion.” The stock, which inched up 0.1% in premarket trade, has lost 9.6% over the past three months, while the S&P 500 has declined 9.8%.

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Supervalu Inc. has named Mark Gross chief executive officer, effective Feb. 5. Gross joins after a decade with Surry Investment Advisors, a private consultancy to grocery distributors and retailers that he founded. He succeeds Sam Duncan, who announced his retirement in October. Duncan will step down from the company’s 11-person board, effective Feb. 29, Supervalu said in a release. Until then he will act as a special adviser to the board. Gross will join the board on Mar. 1. Supervalu shares are inactive in premarket trading and down 57.1% for the past 12 months. The S&P is down 7.2% for the past year.

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Merck & Co. said Wednesday it had net income of $976 million, or 35 cents a share, in the fourth quarter, down from $7.3 billion, or $2.54 a share, in the year-earlier period. Adjusted per-share earnings that exclude acquisition and divestiture costs, as well as restructuring and litigation charges, came to 93 cents, ahead of the FactSet consensus of 91 cents. Sales fell to $10.2 billion from $10.5 billion, slightly below the FactSet consensus of $10.3 billion. Looking ahead, the company said it expects full-year adjusted EPS of $3.60 to $3.75, compared with the current FactSet consensus of $3.72. Sales are expected to range from $38.7 billion to $40.2 billion, compared with a FactSet consensus of $40.3 billion. Shares were slightly lower premarket, and are down 17% in the last 12 months, while the S&P 500 has lost 7%.

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Ireland will hold a general election on Friday, Feb. 26 following the dissolution of parliament, according to news reports Wednesday. Polls suggest the election will result in another coalition government, according to Sky News. The Fine Gael party has been in a coalition with the Labour Party over the past five years. Fine Gael leader and Ireland’s Prime Minister Enda Kenny in a video posted on his Twitter page said the election “is about who will keep [the] recovery going,” five years after Ireland was on the verge of collapse. Ireland exited an international bailout program in 2013.

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