Tag: stock market

The National Football League on Wednesday said it has officially reached a five-year deal with 21st Century Fox Inc.’s Fox Sports to broadcast Thursday Night Football games. The agreement, beginning with the 2018 NFL season, gives Fox Sports 11 games throughout the season, not including games on Thanksgiving day. Thursday night games were previously shared by Comcast Corp.’s NBC and CBS Corp. . Thursday night games have recently been scrutinized by NFL players and fans who say the games are unsafe and don’t provide players enough recovery time, leading to more injuries. Fox shares have gained close to 21% in the last 12 months, while the S&P 500 index is up more than 24% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average is up more than 31%.

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Activision Blizzard Inc. rose 2.8% in Wednesday morning trading after peer Electronic Arts Inc. reported strong digital results and, separately, Needham analyst Laura Martin raised her price target on shares to $80 from $75. Fellow videogame firm EA delivered strong growth in its “live services” business, which has been a boon to the industry lately. Meanwhile, Martin increased her earnings, free-cash-flow, and valuation estimates for Activision in anticipation of benefits from tax reform. She sees Activision’s assumed book tax rate falling to 12% from 24%. “Activision remains a top pick among our media companies under coverage owing to its deep library of proprietary IP content, its (very) long sequel life-spans, rising margins, limited piracy, and relatively predictable revenue streams,” Martin wrote. The company reports results on Fe. 8 after market close. Activision shares have gained 78% over the past 12 months, with the S&P 500 up 24% in that time.

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U.S. equity benchmarks opened higher on Wednesday, recouping some of their losses when the Dow Jones Industrial Average suffered its most severe one-day drop in eight-months. All three stock indexes rose at the open, partially thanks to gains in technology and transport stocks. The Dow rose 0.8% to 26,301, the S&P 500 index climbed 0.4% at 2,832, and the Nasdaq Composite Index opened 0.6% higher at 7,446. A relatively uneventful State of the Union speech by President Trump late Tuesday also aided investor sentiment, market participants said. ADP employment data earlier showed that 234,000 private sector jobs were added in January, slightly below the 250,000 previously. In individual stocks, Electronic Arts Inc. jumped following better-than-expected quarterly results, while shares of Boeing Co. rose as its results exceeded Wall Street estimates and offered a positive outlook. The aerospace maker and Dow component’s shares were delivering the biggest jolt to the blue-chip gauge.

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Shares of Apple Inc. slid 0.4% in premarket trading Wednesday after BMO Capital Markets analyst Tim Long downgraded the stock to market perform from outperform. “There has been much in the press about order cuts for iPhone X, and we believe a weaker mix in Q1 [the December quarter] will push estimates lower for March and beyond,” he wrote. He added that Apple has been very successful in getting customers to pay high prices for phones, but he predicts that only 30% of phones will sell for over $900 given that only 12% of smartphone sales globally are for devices that cost more than $600. Apple’s China business rallied last quarter after several periods of decline, but Long thinks revenue from the region will be flat for the December quarter, with unit sales falling by 9% relative to a year earlier. “We still view the iPhone base as growing, and the devices are on average getting older,” Long wrote. “However, without a compelling product cycle in September, we may see a slow upgrade cycle once again.” Just 10 of the 38 analysts who follow Apple have hold ratings, or the equivalent, on the company’s shares. Apple shares have fallen in six of the last eight trading days, mainly on concerns about a production slowdown for the iPhone X. The stock is up 38% over the past 12 months, compared with a 31% gain for the Dow Jones Industrial Average , of which Apple is a component.

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WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — The Treasury Department on Wednesday said it plans to raise the size of upcoming bond and note auctions this quarter by $42 billion to meet the increased funding needs from the Federal Reserve’s shrinking of its balance sheet and the recently passed tax bill. The department also announced it will auction $66 billion in notes and bonds next week in its quarterly refunding auctions, $4 billion more than last quarter. Treasury said that it will only be able to fund the government through the end of February unless Congress raises the debt ceiling. Treasury will increase the size of 2-year and 3-year note auctions by $2 billion per month this quarter. In addition, Treasury will increase the auction sizes to each of the next offerings of 5-year, 7-year, 10-year notes and the 30-year bond auctions starting in February.

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Shares of Boeing Co. rallied 3.6% in premarket trade Wednesday, after the aerospace and defense contractor reported fourth-quarter profit and revenue that beat expectations, and provided a upbeat outlook. Net income for the quarter to Dec. 31 nearly doubled to $3.13 billion, or $5.18 a share, from $1.63 billion, or $2.59 a share, in the same period a year ago. Tax reform added $1.74 to earnings per share. Excluding non-recurring items, adjusted EPS came to $4.80, well above the FactSet consensus of $2.89. Total revenue rose to $25.37 billion from $23.29 billion, beating the FactSet consensus of $24.64 billion, as revenue from its commercial airplanes, defense, space & security and global services businesses all topped expectations. For 2018, Boeing expects adjusted EPS of $13.80 to $14.00, above the FactSet consensus of $11.91, and projects revenue of $96.0 billion to $98.0 billion, which is above expectations of $93.4 billion. The stock has soared 31% over the past three months, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average has climbed 12%.

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Tupperware Brands Corp. reported a fourth-quarter net loss of $326.5 million, or $6.41 per share, compared with income of $79.0 million, or $1.55 per share for the same period last year. Earnings include a $7.36 non-cash income tax charge related to recent tax reforms. Adjusted EPS was $1.59, exceeding the $1.50 FactSet consensus. Revenue totaled $588.6 million, down from $600.9 million last year and below the $602.0 million FactSet consensus. Sales fell in North American (down 7%), Europe (down 3%) and Asia (down 2%), but rose 6% in South America. Tupperware expects first-quarter sales to up 1% to 3%, EPS from 77 cents to 82 cents and adjusted EPS from $1.01 to $1.06. The FactSet consensus is for EPS of $1.11. Full-year sales are forecast to grow 2% to 4%, EPS is expected to be $4.50 to $4.65, and adjusted EPS is expected to be $5.09 to $5.24. The FactSet EPS consensus is $5.18. Tupperware shares are unchanged in premarket trading, and up 5.7% for the past year. The S&P 500 index is up nearly 24% for the last 12 months.

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A gauge of the dollar’s strength edged slightly higher as President Donald Trump delivered his first official State of the Union address late Tuesday. The ICE U.S. Dollar Index , which measures the buck against a basket of a half-dozen rivals, has been mostly under pressure, but has been ticking slightly higher as Trump touts the strength of the U.S. economy and outlines further fiscal measures, including a $1.5 billion infrastructure spending proposal, to help boost the economy and the equity market. The dollar gauge was up about 0.1% at 89.21, but has been mostly lower in January, down 3.1%, as some investors have interpreted comments from Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin as suggesting that he favored a weaker dollar.

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Brenda Fitzgerald, President Donald Trump’s director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, bought and sold shares in a tobacco company after taking office last year, Politico reported Tuesday, posing a potentially serious conflict of interest. Preventing smoking is a major focus of the CDC. A spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services confirmed the “potentially conflicting” stock purchase to Politico, and said they were made by her financial adviser, and she later sold them. Citing disclosure forms, Politico reported Fitzgerald bought between $1,000 and $15,000 worth of stock in Japan Tobacco Inc. , which owns U.S. brands such as Winston, Camel and Benson & Hedges. She also bought between $1,000 and $15,000 worth of shares in health-care companies Merck & Co. , Bayer and health insurer Humana . Fitzgerald, who took office in July, made the purchases in August and September and sold all her stock holdings by the end of November, Politico reported. Critics called the stock moves “at best, sloppy,” at worst “legally problematic,” Politico said.

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Shares of Xerox Corp. surged in after-hours trading Tuesday after a Wall Street Journal report that Japan’s Fujifilm Holdings Corp. was nearing a deal to buy a little more than half of the company. The Journal said a deal could be announced as soon as Wednesday. Xerox shares jumped as much as 8% in late trading, before settling back to a gain of about 4.4%. Xerox has a market cap of about $8.32 billion. Earlier this month, the Journal reported that activist Xerox investors Carl Icahn and Darwin Deason were urging the company to pursue a sale. Xerox shares closed Tuesday down slightly at $32.68, but are up 12% year to date, compared to the S&P 500’s 5.5% rise.

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