Morning Preview: August 28, 2023

Early Look

Monday, August 28, 2023

Futures

Up/Down

%

Last

Dow

77.00

0.22%

34,454

S&P 500

6.25

0.15%

4,421

Nasdaq

38.00

0.25%

15,017

 

 

U.S. futures are looking at a higher open heading into this final trading week of the summer, attempting to add to last week’s gains after the S&P 500 and Nasdaq snapped their 3-week losing streaks last Friday. The S&P 500 rose 0.8%, the Dow fell 0.4% and the Nasdaq rose 2.3% last week, helped by strong returns on Friday as there was no news from the Jackson Hole Economic Symposium last Friday that ‘significant’ interest rate rises are imminent, boosting some mild upgrades to the global growth outlook, and risk sentiment. Adding to the improved risk sentiment are additional equity support measures by the Chinese authorities, early flagged, but officially announced with additional support measures on Sunday. The Nikkei Index surged 545 points or 1.73% to settle at 32,169, the Shanghai Index gained 34 points to 3,098, and the Hang Seng Index advanced 174 points to 18,130 after Chinese authorities’ enacted measures this weekend to boost the market. In Europe, the German DAX is up 48 points to 15,679, while the FTSE 100 is up a few points to 7,338. Meanwhile, Florida prepares for Tropical Storm Idalia to make landfall on the Gulf Coast. Fed members talked about inflation on Friday and reaching their 2% level. @KobeissiLetter tweeted “Since 2020, the US has printed nearly 80% of ALL US Dollars in circulation. To put that in perspective, at the start of 2020 we had ~$4 trillion in circulation. Now, there is nearly $19 TRILLION in circulation, a 375% jump in 3 years. We are paying the price for trillions of Dollars that were printed seemingly overnight. Why is the Fed surprised that inflation hit a 40-yr high?”

 

Market Closing Prices Yesterday

·     The S&P 500 Index gained 29.41 points, or 0.67%, to 4,405.72.

·     The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 247.54 points, or 0.73%, to 34,346.96.

·     The Nasdaq Composite jumped 126.67 points, or 0.94%, to 13,590.65.

·     The Russell 2000 Index advanced 7.35 points, or 0.40% to 1,853.63.

 

Economic Calendar for Today

·     10:30 AM ET                Dallas Fed Manufacturing for August

·     1:00 PM ET                   US Treasury to sell $42B in 2-year notes.

·     1:00 PM ET                   US Treasury to sell $43B in 5-year notes.

 

Earnings Calendar:

·     Earnings Before the Open: None

·     Earnings After the Close: HEI JOAN LFVN

 

Other Key Events:

·     Piper 2023 Texas Bank Tour, 8/28-8/30, in Dallas, TX

·     Stephens Restaurant Investor Field Trip, 8/28-8/30

·     Stifel Tech Executive Summit Deer Valley, 8/28-8/30, in Utah

·     William Blair West Coast Med Tech & Life Sciences Field Trip, 8/28-8/31 in San Diego

 

 

Macro

Up/Down

Last

Nymex

0.07

79.90

Brent

-0.13

84.35

Gold

1.80

1,941.70

EUR/USD

0.0016

1.0816

JPY/USD

0.13

146.54

10-Year Note

-0.004

4.235%

 

 

World News

·     China reduces tax on stock trading by 50% to boost market.

·     Australian Retails sales in June increased by 0.5%, higher than the expected 0.3%. This adds some uncertainty on consumer demand even as pressure on household budgets increases.

 

Sector News Breakdown

Consumer

·     SharkNinja (SN) has been a consistent and successful innovator in small appliances, an industry marked by slow growth and a few exciting new products. Now, its stock can be a consistent and successful investment as well, Andrew Bary writes in this week’s edition of Barron’s.

·     Xpeng (XPEV) acquired Didi’s smart auto development business for $744 million, and Xpeng will issue consideration shares to DIDI at HK$64.03 each share.

·     Church & Dwight (CHD) upgraded to Buy from Hold at Truist.

·     Energizer (ENR) downgraded to Hold from Buy at Truist.

·     In autos (GM, F, STLA), Unifor autoworkers overwhelmingly vote to authorize strikes at GM, Ford, Stellantis.

 

Energy

·     Hawaiian Electric (HE) shares rise 36% pre mkt after saying Maui county’s lawsuit is “factually and legally irresponsible”, pointing to the county’s responsibility; said the fire caused by downed power lines was later reported “100% contained” and declared “extinguished” by County Fire Department. Said afternoon fire in the same area after all its power lines in West Maui had been de-energized, could not be contained by fire department.

·     Oil prices rose after China announced measures to boost its stock and property markets, helping offset concerns about increased supply and monetary tightening in the US and Europe.

·     Eni has begun oil and gas production at the giant Baleine field in deep waters offshore Ivory Coast, the energy group said on Monday, confirming a previous announcement by the Ivorian energy ministry.

·     Sinopec Corp is not interested in acquiring Shell’s (SHEL) refinery or petrochemical plant in Singapore, Sinopec President Yu Baocai said on Monday. The remark comes after Reuters reported last week that Sinopec was among the companies interested in the assets.

·     Atmos Energy (ATO) downgraded to Equal Weight at Wells Fargo following strong performance.

 

Financials

·     Allstate (ALL), Arch Capital Group (ACGL), Ryan Specialty Holdings (RYAN), Guidewire Software (GWRE) among companies’ insurers/companies that could capitalize on strong demand for insurance according to Barron’s. Notes backed by nearly $1T in capital and rising premiums, insurers might profit from the coming wave of catastrophic weather.

 

Healthcare

·     The Federal Trade Commission suspended its challenge of Amgen’s (AMGN) $27.8B acquisition of Horizon Therapeutics (HZNP), giving the agency time to weigh a settlement that would allow the deal to close with conditions – WSJ https://tinyurl.com/yt5eetbd

·     Boston Scientific (BSX) said the Advent study of the Farapulse™ pulsed field ablation system meets primary efficacy and safety endpoints; said data demonstrated Farapulse pfa system was noninferior to standard-of-care therapies, meeting primary efficacy and safety endpoints.

·     BridgeBio Pharma (BBIO) announced detailed results from its Phase 3 ATTRibute-CM study of acoramidis for patients with ATTR-CM. A highly statistically significant result, demonstrated by a Win Ratio of 1.8, was observed on the primary endpoint. This result was consistent across both variant and wild-type ATTR-CM patients, as well as across NYHA Class I, II and III patients.

·     ImmunoGen, Inc. (IMGN) said it has entered an exclusive collaboration with Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited (TAK) to develop and commercialize ELAHERE (mirvetuximab soravtansine-gynx) in Japan.

 

Industrials & Materials

·     3M Co. (MMM) has tentatively agreed to pay more than $5.5 billion to resolve over 300,000 lawsuits claiming it sold the US military defective combat earplugs, people familiar with the deal said – Bloomberg reported https://tinyurl.com/mryrwey4

·     JB Hunt J(JBHT) Knight (KNX), CH Robinson (CHRW), Werner Enterprises (WERN): @FreightAlley tweeted last night: “Truckers looking for a rate catalyst may get it from Hurricane Idalia. Hurricanes always create spot market opportunities, rate surges, and market chaos. While the human and economic toll is devastating, the bigger the hurricane, the bigger the rates.

·     In an interview on Saturday, U.S. trade representative Katherine Tai said that China’s control of rare earth means it could turn on or turn off the faucet which gives it large leverage over US supply chains. – CNBC

·     Virgin Galactic (SPCE) announces flight window for third commercial spaceflight; said flight window opens Sept 8th.

 

Technology, Media & Telecom

·     Crowdstrike (CRWD) downgraded to Equal Weight from Overweight at Morgan Stanley and cut tgt to $167 from $178, cautious into the fiscal Q2 earnings report this week.

·     Macom (MTSI) upgraded to Buy from Hold at Benchmark with a $92 price target.

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Market commentary provided by Hammerstone Markets, Inc, a firm separate from and not affiliated with Regal Securities. Regal Securities has not participated in the creation of the content, and does not explicitly or implicitly endorse the content.