Tag: stock market

Corn prices climbed Thursday, set to mark their highest settlement since July, after the U.S. Department of Agriculture cut its forecast for 2017/2018 corn ending stocks by 225 million bushels to 2.127 billion bushels. In a monthly report, the USDA “surprised markets with a lower than expected estimate for end of season corn stocks, primarily due to an unexpectedly large projected increase in U.S. corn exports,” said Sal Gilbertie, president and chief investment officer at Teucrium Trading LLC. The USDA raised its estimate on exports by 175 million bushels to 2.225 billion bushels, which it said would be down from the prior marketing year. May corn rose 4 1/2 cents, or 1.2%, to $3.91 3/4 a bushel in Chicago. A settlement around this level would be the highest since July 2017, according to FactSet data.

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The Mexican peso and Canadian dollar strengthened somewhat against the U.S. dollar on Thursday, after President Donald Trump reiterated that Mexico and Canada could be exempt from the impending U.S. import tariffs on steel and aluminum. The tariffs are expected to be announced this afternoon. Trump also said that it would be easier to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement between the three countries, rather than terminating it. The seventh round of efforts to rejig the trade pact concluded on Tuesday. The Mexican peso rose 0.1% against the dollar, with one buck buying 18.7051 pesos. The Canadian dollar meanwhile remained weaker against its U.S. rival, even though it pared some of its losses following Trump’s comments. The greenback last bought C$1.2942, up 0.3%.

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Walt Disney Co. said on Thursday that “Iron Man” and “The Jungle Book” director Jon Favreau has signed on to executive produce and write a live-action “Star Wars” series for Disney’s upcoming standalone streaming service. “I couldn’t be more excited about Jon coming on board to produce and write for the new direct-to-consumer platform,” Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy said in a statement. During the company’s most recent quarterly conference call in February, Disney Chief Bob Iger said they were developing a few “Star Wars” series specifically to stream on it’s forthcoming service. Disney did not provide a release date for Favreau’s live-action “Star Wars” series, nor did it give insight into the story Favreau would delve into. The long-awaited streaming service is scheduled to launch in the fall of 2019. Favreau, who has a role in the upcoming film “Solo: A Star Wars Story,” is currently in production for Disney’s update of “The Lion King,” which is also set to be released in 2019. Shares of Disney have declined more than 6% in the last 12 months, while the S&P 500 index is up more than 15%.

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Walt Disney Co. said on Thursday that “Iron Man” and “The Jungle Book” director Jon Favreau has signed on to executive produce and write a live-action “Star Wars” series for Disney’s upcoming standalone streaming service. “I couldn’t be more excited about Jon coming on board to produce and write for the new direct-to-consumer platform,” Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy said in a statement. During the company’s most recent quarterly conference call in February, Disney Chief Bob Iger said they were developing a few “Star Wars” series specifically to stream on it’s forthcoming service. Disney did not provide a release date for Favreau’s live-action “Star Wars” series, nor did it give insight into the story Favreau would delve into. The long-awaited streaming service is scheduled to launch in the fall of 2019. Favreau, who has a role in the upcoming film “Solo: A Star Wars Story,” is currently in production for Disney’s update of “The Lion King,” which is also set to be released in 2019. Shares of Disney have declined more than 6% in the last 12 months, while the S&P 500 index is up more than 15%.

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The White House is due to meet with certain videogame executives this afternoon about violence in games, but shares of the major publishers are up ahead of the meeting. Activision Blizzard Inc. is leading the pack, with shares up 2.8%. Shares of Electronic Arts Inc. and Take-Two Interactive Software Inc. are up 1% and 0.8%, respectively. “Trump’s scapegoat meeting with game industry reps doesn’t worry me,” Benchmark analyst Mike Hickey wrote in a recent note to clients. He cites a 2011 Supreme Court decision that deemed videogames an expression of First Amendment rights. “Future courts will rely on this decision to make their own judgments, and that would apply to any law that Trump may attempt to spearhead through congress,” Hickey added. Activision shares are up 57% over the past 12 months, while EA shares are up 45% and Take-Two shares are up 89%. The S&P 500 has gained 16% in that time.

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MoviePass has hired former Viacom Inc. , Spotify and Comcast Corp. executive Mike Berkley to serve as the cinema-going subscription service’s chief product officer, according to a Variety report. Representatives for MoviePass and MoviePass owner Helios & Matheson Analytics Inc. were not readily reachable for comment. MoviePass has often struggled to keep up with the rapid growth its experienced since cutting the price of its monthly subscription to $10 from as much as $50 last August. The company has been building out a team to handle the demands of its new prominence, including hiring a chief marketing officer and head of fraud prevention. Berkley said in a statement acquired by Variety that MoviePass is one of the most exciting companies to emerge in the industry in recent years, that it’s having the same sort of impact on theatrical exhibition of films that Netflix Inc. has had on TV. Shares of MoviePass owner Helios & Matheson have gained more than 48% in the last 12 months, while the S&P 500 index is up close to 16%.

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Shares of Progress Software Corp. tumbled 9.3% toward a three-month low in morning trade Thursday, Benchmark swung to bearish from bullish on the business software company after one of its largest shareholders disclosed the sale of its entire stake. Praesidium Investment Management Co. said in an SEC filing late Wednesday that it no longer owned any voting shares of Progress Software, after disclosing last month that it owned 4.33 million shares, or about 9.3% of the shares outstanding as of March 31. Analyst Mark Schappel at Benchmark downgraded Progress Software to sell from buy, as Praesidium’s sale of its entire stake in the company means the activist hedge fund “will no longer be a change agent for the company and a catalyst for the stock.” He slashed his stock price to $35 from $42. He said given the stock’s “meaningful appreciation” since Praesidium went public with its strategy demands, “we believe the hedge fund determined that most of the ‘easy money’ had been made, and that further share gains would likely come at the expense of an arduous, costly and time consuming proxy battle, which was likely the next step in the process.” The stock has still rallied 39.2% over the past 12 months, while the S&P 500 has gained 15.5%.

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The U.S. Energy Information Administration reported Thursday that domestic supplies of natural gas fell by 57 billion cubic feet for the week ended March 2. Analysts surveyed by S&P Global Platts had forecast a decrease of 59 billion, but the five-year average withdrawal is 129 billion. Total stocks now stand at 1.625 trillion cubic feet, down 680 billion cubic feet from a year ago, and 300 billion below the five-year average, the government said. April natural gas was down 2.7 cents, or 1%, at $2.75 per million British thermal units, little changed from before the data.

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The Securities and Exchange Commission charged Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Inc. with failing to perform required gatekeeping functions in the unregistered sales of securities on behalf of a China-based issuer. The order found the Bank of America unit sold nearly 3 million shares of Longtop Financial Technological Limited’s securities despite red flags indicating that the sales could be part of an unlawful unregistered distribution. Merrill Lynch didn’t admit or deny findings and paid a $1.25 million penalty and more than $154,000 in disgorgement and prejudgment interest.

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U.S. equity markets opened modestly higher on Thursday as investors appeared less worried about the prospect of trade wars, expecting recently announced tariffs to be watered down to exempt major trading partners such as Canada and Mexico, according to some reports. President Donald Trump is expected to sign a decree that lays out his plan for levies on steel and aluminum imports this week, perhaps as soon as 3:30 p.m. Eastern Time on Thursday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 75 points, or 0.3%, to 24,876. The S&P 500 index rose 5 points, or 0.2% to 2,733, while the Nasdaq Composite gained 28 points, or 0.4% to 7,424. Among the best performers on the S&P 500, Express Scripts Holding Company soared after news that Cigna would buy it in a $67 billion deal.

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