Equity futures were weaker in early trading as firming yields continue to rattle stocks, though futures bounced after billionaire fund manager David Tepper told CNBC he finds it hard to be bearish under current circumstances. Despite's Tepper's bullishness, and that of a number of Wall Street analysts about tech, the Nasdaq is the underperformer at midday while the Dow and S&P are regaining some more of their recent losses.
ECONOMIC EVENTS: In the U.S., wholesale inventories beat the advance figures, with an unrevised 1.3% rise in the final January print, while sales climbed a better than expected 4.9%. Both wholesale sales and inventories have been lifted by the combination of surging prices and rapidly climbing imports.
Data from the Johns Hopkins Whiting School of Engineering shows there are now 117M confirmed cases of COVID-19 worldwide, including 29M in the U.S., and 2.6M deaths due to the disease, including 525,000 in the U.S.
TOP NEWS: Microsoft (MSFT) is in focus after KrebsOnSecurity reported Friday evening that over 30,000 organizations across the U.S., including a large number of small businesses, towns, cities, and local governments, have in the past few days been hacked by an aggressive Chinese cyber espionage unit centered on stealing email from victim organizations. The espionage unit is exploiting four newly-found flaws in Microsoft Exchange Server email software, and has seeded hundreds of thousands of victim organizations globally with tools that give hackers total remote control over impacted systems, according to Krebs. Such recent hacks may well end up far eclipsing the damage done by the SolarWinds (SWI) hacks, Krebs noted. Following the news, Reuters reported that the White House urged computer network operators to take further steps to gauge whether their systems were targeted amid the hack.
Shares of Athene Holding (ATH) rose 7% after it agreed to merge with Apollo Global (APO) in an all-stock transaction that implies a total equity value of roughly $11B for Athene. As part of the announcement, Apollo said it would shift to having a single class of common stock, as well as eliminate special governance rights. Apollo shares are 5% lower at midday after the news.
Also on the M&A front, General Electric (GE) shares were 5% higher near noon after The Wall Street Journal reported that the U.S. conglomerate is nearing a $30B-plus deal to combine its aircraft-leasing business, GECAS, with Ireland's AerCap (AER).
In other M&A news, shares of McAfee (MCFE) jumped 14% after agreeing to sell its enterprise business to a consortium led by Symphony Technology Group in an all-cash transaction for $4B.
Meanwhile, Merck (MRK) shares rose 3% after the company and Ridgeback Therapeutics reported that molnupiravir, their COVID-19 therapeutic, hit one of its secondary endpoints in a Phase 2a trial. Additionally, Reuters reported that President Joe Biden plans to meet with the chief executives of Merck and Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) at the White House on Wednesday after the companies recently announced a COVID-19 vaccine manufacturing deal.
MAJOR MOVERS: Among the noteworthy gainers was Second Sight (EYES), which surged 95% after announcing the FDA has approved the Argus 2s Retinal Prosthesis System. Also higher was GameStop (GME), which rose 42% after the company formed a Strategic Planning and Capital Allocation Committee that will include Chewy (CHWY) founder Ryan Cohen as chairperson. The committee will "identify initiatives that can further accelerate the company's transformation."
Among the notable losers was AnaptysBio (ANAB), which declined 35% after its imsidolimab POLAR Phase 2 trial did not meet its primary endpoint. Also lower was GSX Techedu (GSX), which fell 8% after CLSA analyst Jeffrey Chan downgraded the stock to Sell from Outperform with a price target of $76, up from $68.
INDEXES: Near midday, the Dow was up 583.68, or 1.85%, to 32,079.98, the Nasdaq was down 55.49, or 0.43%, to 12,864.66, and the S&P 500 was up 33.12, or 0.86%, to 3,875.06.
Microsoft
-1.1 (-0.47%)
SolarWinds
+0.13 (+0.81%)
Athene Holding
+3.2 (+6.55%)
Apollo Global
-2.5 (-5.04%)
McAfee
+2.95 (+13.88%)
GE Aerospace
+0.675 (+4.97%)
AerCap
+7.93 (+15.60%)
Merck
+2.03 (+2.78%)
Johnson & Johnson
+2.42 (+1.55%)
Second Sight
+5.82 (+102.28%)
GameStop
+49.39 (+36.05%)
Chewy
-2.76 (-3.33%)
AnaptysBio
-10.09 (-34.27%)
Symbol now GOTU
-8.72 (-9.43%)