U.S. stocks traded lower toward the end of trading, with the Dow Jones falling more than 350 points on Wednesday.
The Dow traded down 1.05% to 34,442.47 while the NASDAQ fell 1.09% to 13,953.32. The S&P also fell, dropping, 0.99% to 4,466.85.
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Leading and Lagging Sectors
Energy shares jumped by 1.8% on Wednesday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Comstock Resources, Inc. (NYSE:CRK), up 10% and BP Prudhoe Bay Royalty Trust (NYSE:BPT) up 8%.
In trading on Wednesday, financials shares fell by 1.7%.
Top Headline
General Mills, Inc. (NYSE:GIS) reported better-than-expected earnings for its third quarter and raised its FY22 outlook.
General Mills posted adjusted earnings of $0.84 per share, beating market expectations of $0.78 per share. The company’s quarterly sales came in at $4.54 billion, missing estimates of $4.56 billion.
General Mills boosted its FY22 organic net sales growth guidance from 4%-5% to 5%. It also expects adjusted per-share profit between flat and a growth of 2%, versus its prior range of a 2% drop to a 1% growth.
Equities Trading UP
4D pharma plc (NASDAQ:LBPS) shares shot up 29% to $6.04 after the company announced the primary efficacy endpoint was met early in the renal cell carcinoma group in Part B of the study of MRx0518 and KEYTRUDA.
Shares of Zentek Ltd. (NASDAQ:ZTEK) got a boost, shooting 23% to $3.33. On Tuesday, the stock began trading on the Nasdaq following an uplisting from OTC Pink Sheets.
Allego N.V. (NYSE:ALLG) shares were also up, gaining 128% to $18.87 after the company announced the completion of its merger agreement with Spartan Acquisition Corp., which resulted in 98% of the company notes redeemed at the merger vote. The company is also gaining retail investor interest.
Equities Trading DOWN
Vicor Corporation (NASDAQ:VICR) shares tumbled 18% to $63.47. CJS Securities downgraded Vicor from Market Outperform to Market Perform.
Shares of Codex DNA, Inc. (NASDAQ:DNAY) were down 27% to $6.70 after the company reported worse-than-expected Q4 EPS results.
Snap One Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ:SNPO) was down, falling 19% to $16.59 after the company reported Q4 earnings results. JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley lowered their price targets in the stock.
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Commodities
In commodity news, oil traded up 1.8% to $113.75, while gold traded up 0.7% to $1,935.80.
Silver traded up 1.1% Wednesday to $25.185 while copper rose 1.7% to $4.7810.
Euro zone
European shares closed lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 fell 1.01%, London’s FTSE 100 slipped 0.22%, while Spain’s IBEX 35 Index fell 1.87%. The German DAX dropped 1.31%, French CAC 40 fell 1.17% and Italy’s FTSE MIB Index fell 0.96%.
Annual inflation rate in the UK accelerated to 6.2% in February from 5.5% in January, while headline rate of output prices rose to 10.1% year-over-year in February.
Economics
Mortgage applications in the US declined 8.1% in the week ended March 18th.
US new home sales fell 2% to an annual rate of 772,000 in February.
US crude oil inventories declined by 2.508 million barrels to 413.4 million barrels in the week ended March 18th, the Energy Information Administration said.
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COVID-19 Update
The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 81,476,260 cases with around 999,790 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 43,012,740 cases and 516,630 deaths, while Brazil reported over 29,683,680 COVID-19 cases with 657,770 deaths. In total, there were at least 474,776,970 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 6,123,010 deaths.
