The SPX and Nasdaq will try to bounce back from Friday's losing session
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) is on pace to hit a fresh record high this morning, with Dow futures pointing toward a positive open. While earnings will continue to roll in, traders today will digest an onslaught of economic data. Specifically, the Dallas Fed's manufacturing index, the Chicago purchasing managers index (PMI), and pending home sales all come out today. This will all set the stage for Friday's highly anticipated July jobs report. In the meantime, today's pre-market move has the Dow poised for a fifth straight win, while futures on the S&P 500 Index (SPX) and Nasdaq-100 Index (NDX) are also signaling an up day for U.S. stocks.
Continue reading for more on today's market, including:
- The Nasdaq signal calling for new highs.
- Analysts are predicting record highs from this cloud stock after impressive earnings.
- Why more highs could be in store for Expedia stock.
- Plus, the biotech stock set to double; today's big M&A news; and GameStop is getting cracked.
5 Things You Need to Know Today
- The Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE) saw 1 million call contracts traded on Friday, compared to 630,933 put contracts. The single-session equity put/call ratio fell to 0.63, and the 21-day moving average remained at 0.62.
- Dynavax Technologies Corporation (NASDAQ:DVAX) is on pace to double in value when the market opens, thanks to news a panel of Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advisers said data for the company's hepatitis B vaccine indicated it was safe. After the decision, RBC said the approval of the vaccine is now "highly probable," upgrading the stock to "outperform" from "sector perform" and more than tripling its price target to $26 from $7. Closing at $9.25 on Friday, DVAX stock was already up 134% year-to-date.
- Confirming recent buyout rumors, Discovery Communications Inc. (NASDAQ:DISCA) announced it's buying Scripps Networks Interactive, Inc. (NASDAQ:SNI) in a cash-and-stock deal for $14.6 billion. That values SNI stock at $90 per share. The equity was trading south of $70 before the M&A reports hit the Street earlier this month, and closed Friday at $86.91.
- Shares of video game retailer GameStop Corp. (NYSE:GME) are getting hit hard in electronic trading, down 4.2%. At the moment, there's no clear news before the move, but GME stock has struggled over the past year, dropping 31%.
- Diamond Offshore Drilling (DO), Loews (L), Owens-Illinois (OI), Pandora (P), Sohu.com (SOHU), and Texas Roadhouse (TXRH) will all report earnings today.
Overseas Trading
Stocks in Asia settled mostly higher today, as traders brushed off a softer-than-forecast PMI out of Beijing. Rising tensions over North Korea's latest missile test propped up gold futures and the Japanese yen, with both assets capitalizing on their safe-haven status. As a result, the Nikkei fell 0.2% to lag regional returns, and notched its first monthly decline since March. Meanwhile, Hong Kong's Hang Seng gained 1.3%, led by a 6.8% pop in Hutchison Telecom on news of $1.9 billion in asset sales, as well as a strong post-earnings performance from HSBC. Rounding out the day's gains, China's Shanghai Composite closed up 0.6%, while South Korea's Kospi eked out an advance of 0.07%.
European markets are pointed cautiously higher at midday, led by strength in banking stocks and miners. Traders eyed data showing an eight-year low in eurozone unemployment, along with a surprise uptick in core inflation for the currency bloc. At last check, the German DAX and London's FTSE 100 have both added about 0.3%, while the French CAC 40 is 0.1% higher.