Month: October 2023

© Reuters

Investing.com — U.S. futures edged higher Tuesday, ahead of the start of the latest two-day policy meeting of the U.S. Federal Reserve.

Here are some of the biggest premarket U.S. stock movers today:

Pfizer (NYSE:PFE) stock fell 0.2% after the drugmaker reported its first quarterly loss since 2019, as it recorded charges largely related to its COVID products, co-developed with BioNTech (NASDAQ:BNTX).

Pinterest (NYSE:PINS) stock soared 16% after the image sharing platform reported third quarter results that topped expectations as efforts to improve monetization of its international users on its platform bolstered performance.

Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) stock fell 1.5%, continuing Monday’s hefty losses after the EV manufacturer’s key supplier Panasonic (OTC:PCRFY) said it cut automotive battery production in the September quarter, cementing concerns of a global slowdown in electric-vehicle sales.

Marathon Petroleum (NYSE:MPC) stock rose 0.5% after the refiner beat estimates for third-quarter profit, benefiting from strong demand for fuel and refined products amid tight supplies.

Caterpillar (NYSE:CAT) stock fell 4.3% after the heavy equipment manufacturer reported a decline in its order backlog, indicating customer demand may be waning. This has overshadowed a rise in third-quarter profit.

VF Corp (NYSE:VFC) stock dropped 6% after the apparel company withdrew its full-year revenue and profit forecasts, with demand for its higher-priced apparel and footwear easing.

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) stock gained 10% after the cloud networking solutions developer reported better than expected results in the latest quarter, signaling that demand for cloud and artificial-intelligence offerings remains strong.

JetBlue (NASDAQ:JBLU) stock fell 7.1% after the low-cost airline posted a wider-than-expected loss in the third quarter and offered disappointing full-year guidance.

Anheuser Busch Inbev (EBR:ABI) (NYSE:BUD) ADRs rose 4% after the world’s largest brewer announced a $1 billion share buyback after beating third-quarter expectations, although the Bud Light boycott hit U.S. revenues.

BP (NYSE:BP) ADRs fell 3.1% after the energy giant missed expectations with its third-quarter earnings as strong oil trading and refining margins were offset by weak gas results.

© Reuters

Investing.com — Here is your Pro Recap of the biggest analyst picks you may have missed today: upgrades at Chewy, XPO Logistics , Arista Networks , and SoFi Technologies.

InvestingPro subscribers got this news first. Never miss another market-moving headline.

Roku upped to Neutral

Roku (NASDAQ:ROKU) popped 3% after MoffettNathanson upgraded the stock to Neutral from Sell, maintaining its existing $55.00 price target.

The analysts said the unchanged price target was based on their “imputed EBITDA valuation approach,” but that the upgrade from Sell reflects “our increased confidence in the profitability outlook. In right sizing the expense base, the path to profitability is clearer even at slower rates of revenue growth.”

The analysts added, “Further, we struggle to find meaningful downside at current levels.”

Shares were recently trading at $58.06.

Chewy’s selloff overdone, says Morgan Stanley

Chewy (NYSE:CHWY) shares gained more than 3% recently after Morgan Stanley upgraded the company to Overweight from Equalweight with a price target of $28.00 (from $31.00), as reported in real time on InvestingPro.

Morgan Stanley views the recent investor reaction to worries about US market saturation – which have prompted an over-50% drop since mid-July – as “overdone.” The company’s customer base is showing a marginal dip of about 1% from 2021 levels, and the market is concerned that the pet food name may face challenges in further expanding that base.

The analysts believe that the macro backdrop has played a much larger part than appreciated and wrote, “According to our analysis, CHWY is still gaining market share on both a revenue and customer basis,” they wrote.

Shares were lately changing hands at $19.24.

XPO Logistics earns an upgrade at Jefferies

Jefferies upgraded XPO (NYSE:XPO) to Buy from Hold and raised its price target to $95.00 from $81.00 following the company’s strong Q3 beat, which led to more than a 15% jump in the stock price on Monday.

The analysts emphasized their increased confidence in the long-term margin opportunity at XPO, writing:

“Two major events over the last six months have changed our view on XPO’s margin execution: (1) the company’s appointment of COO Dave Bates, long-time ODFL SVP of Ops (best-in-class operator) and (2) the bankruptcy of #3 player YELL and subsequent volume dispersion. The strategy is clear: invest to improve service which drives pricing and margin.”

Shares were dipping a little over 1% in recent trading to $76.43.

© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Japanese Yen and U.S. dollar banknotes are seen in this illustration taken March 10, 2023. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo

By Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss and Joice Alves

NEW YORK/LONDON (Reuters) – The yen slumped across the board on Tuesday, dropping to a fresh 15-year low against the euro and a new one-year trough versus the dollar, after a small step by the Bank of Japan (BOJ) toward ending years of monetary stimulus failed to appease some investors who had expected a bigger move.

The Japanese unit also fell against sterling, the Swiss franc, and the Australian dollar.

At the conclusion of its two-day policy meeting, the BOJ further loosened its grip on long-term interest rates by tweaking its bond yield control policy again, taking another small step towards dismantling its controversial monetary stimulus of the past decade.

BOJ said it would keep the 10-year government bond yield around 0% set under its yield curve control (YCC), but re-defined 1.0% as a loose “upper bound” rather than a rigid cap.

It also removed a pledge to defend the level with offers to buy unlimited amounts of bonds.

The euro jumped to a 15-year high against the Japanese currency of 160.84 yen, and was last up 1.3% at 160.20 yen.

The yen slid to 151.20 against the dollar, a fresh one-year low as traders focused on the BOJ’s dovish pledge to “patiently” maintain accommodative policy and forecast inflation would drop back below 2% in 2025. The dollar was last up 1.4% at 151.07 yen.

The Japanese yen had risen to a two-week high on Monday on a Nikkei report that the BOJ would tweak its yield curve control policy, prompting market participants to believe that the BOJ would do more.

“Markets are disappointed with the Bank of Japan’s muddled messaging and indecisive policy direction,” said Karl Schamotta, chief market strategist at Corpay in Toronto.

“By moving to a reference point and failing to scrap the yield cap outright, policymakers maintained ambiguity around where and why they might intervene in bond markets, and lessened the likelihood of a wider surge in repatriation flows.”

HIGHER RATES FOR LONGER

In the United States, U.S. data continued to depict a resilient economy.

U.S. labor costs increased solidly in the third quarter amid strong wage growth, data showed, the latest indication that the Federal Reserve could keep interest rates high for some time. The Employment Cost Index (ECI), the broadest measure of labor costs, rose 1.1% last quarter after increasing 1.0% in the April-June period.

Another piece of data indicated that U.S. annual home price growth accelerated for a third straight month in August, underscoring the recovery of the housing market after a period of softening.

Home prices rose 5.6% on a year-over-year basis in August, up from a 4.6% increase in the prior month, the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) said.

Fed officials were due to start a two-day policy meeting on Tuesday. The Fed is expected to leave interest rates unchanged but maintain its hawkish stance at the conclusion of that meeting, given that the surge in U.S. Treasury yields and the stock market sell-off have tightened financial conditions.

The dollar index was last up 0.3% at 106.43.

While the index looked set to end the month broadly unchanged, analysts say the dollar remains underpinned by risks of another rate hike from the Fed, noting a still-resilient U.S. economy.

“The Fed can still have the luxury of sounding hawkish in its outlook, by stressing the ‘high for long’ narrative,” said Thierry Wizman, Macquarie’s global FX and interest rates strategist.

In other currencies, sterling was down 0.2% at $1.2141 ahead of an interest rate decision by the Bank of England later in the week where expectations are also for the central bank to stand pat.

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Currency bid prices at 10:37AM (1437 GMT)

Description RIC Last U.S. Close Pct Change YTD Pct High Bid Low Bid

Previous Change

Session

Dollar index 106.4700 106.1600 +0.31% 2.880% +106.5600 +105.8900

Euro/Dollar $1.0604 $1.0616 -0.11% -1.04% +$1.0675 +$1.0591

Dollar/Yen 151.1050 149.0500 +1.38% +15.25% +151.1850 +149.0300

Euro/Yen 160.23 158.20 +1.28% +14.21% +160.8400 +158.2100

Dollar/Swiss 0.9065 0.9019 +0.53% -1.95% +0.9074 +0.9010

Sterling/Dollar $1.2138 $1.2168 -0.23% +0.38% +$1.2200 +$1.2127

Dollar/Canadian 1.3874 1.3827 +0.35% +2.41% +1.3877 +1.3815

Aussie/Dollar $0.6331 $0.6374 -0.66% -7.12% +$0.6375 +$0.6328

Euro/Swiss 0.9610 0.9572 +0.40% -2.88% +0.9624 +0.9558

Euro/Sterling 0.8733 0.8720 +0.15% -1.26% +0.8753 +0.8722

NZ $0.5816 $0.5844 -0.47% -8.39% +$0.5857 +$0.5814

Dollar/Dollar

Dollar/Norway 11.1720 11.1420 +0.55% +14.15% +11.2040 +11.1320

Euro/Norway 11.8479 11.8160 +0.27% +12.90% +11.8840 +11.8160

Dollar/Sweden 11.1513 11.1378 +0.00% +7.14% +11.1801 +11.0858

Euro/Sweden 11.8251 11.8254 +0.00% +6.06% +11.8434 +11.8077