Stocks close lower in choppy session following Powell’s Senate testimony
Dow components Home Depot and Caterpillar slide
Dow components Home Depot and Caterpillar slide
Shares of Worldpay Inc. WP, +8.20% are up more than 7% in morning trading Tuesday after the company reported better-than-expected December-quarter results.
Dollar traders focus Fed Chairman Jerome Powell’s semiannual testimony in Washington this week
London’s markets struggled on Monday, bucking a positive trend for the rest of Europe’s indexes, after the pound rose and held back the FTSE 100 on the news U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May has delayed a parliamentary vote on her Brexit deal.
Heavyweight miners boosted London’s indexes.
The FTSE 100 UKX, +0.07% was slightly subdued on Monday compared to the rest of Europe’s markets, flat at 7,179.20 after finishing 0.8% down for the week last Friday.
Market momentum was held back by a strong pound GBPUSD, +0.3130% which fetched $1.3073 from $1.3055 late on Friday in New York, after Prime Minister Theresa May pushed back U.K. parliament’s vote on her Brexit deal to March 12.
The relief comes from hopes that Britain’s official exit date “will likely be extended given that the vote could take place just 17 days before the U.K. is officially due to exit the European Union” according to Dean Popplewell, vice president of Market Analysis. Furthermore, the delay is likely to reduce the chance of Britain leaving the European Union with no-deal, removing a thin layer of uncertainty.
Heavyweight miners supported the FTSE 100 on Monday, with Glencore PLC GLEN, -1.15% up 2%, Antofagasta PLC ANTO, +2.14% jumping by 1.7% and Evraz PLC EVR, +1.16% adding 1.2%.
Global stocks rose after President Donald Trump’s tariff deadline delay to $200 billion of Chinese goods. He tweeted on Sunday “substantial progress” had been made during negotiations between the world’s two largest economies.
Persimmon PLC PSN, -4.70% tumbled 5.3% on Monday, after the UK-listed home builder came under fire from UK housing minister James Brokenshire for its practices in a government funded housing scheme called “Help to Buy”, Reuters reported. In sympathy, Barratt Developments PLC BDEV, -0.35% and Taylor Wimpey PLC TW., -1.31% also dropped by around 2%.
Bunzl PLC BNZL, -3.66% lost over 3% on Monday, despite a rise in profits and an upbeat outlook from the distribution-and-outsourcing company.
After Associated British Food PLC ABF, -1.73% warned it expects to report a flat first-half adjusted earnings on sales, its share price dropped by 1.4%.
Meanwhile, AstraZeneca PLC AZN, +2.13% climbed by 1.7% after the heavyweight pharmaceutical company announced its heart drug Brilinta had met a goal in a late-stage trail, which showed a statistically significant reduction in major adverse cardiovascular events compared to aspirin alone.
With deadline looming, EU’s Tusk says Brexit delay would be ‘rational’
The news that Roche had acquired Spark for more than a 120% premium to Friday’s closing price had investors speculating the deal was a signal of yet more M&A activity in the space ahead.
GE’s stock ends at nearly 4-month high on biopharma divestiture announcement
Roche Holding AG is nearing a deal to buy Philadelphia biotechnology company Spark Therapeutics Inc., according to people familiar with the matter, as the Swiss drugmaker seeks to expand its presence treating hemophilia.
Report Friday revealed transmission of sensitive information
Michael Cohen, Donald Trump’s former lawyer, is scheduled to testify before lawmakers next week, and he’s expected to get grilled about his role as the president’s longtime fixer, specifically regarding “payoffs, financial disclosures compliance with campaign finance laws, business practices and other matters,” according to a statement released by the House Oversight Committee.
But one former White House staffer speculates he’ll “share the inner-workings of the Trump crime family” and potentially hit Trump where it hurts most:
‘There is no question that that big red line for Donald Trump is his children, particularly Ivanka, and once Michael Cohen starts sharing details that may actually implicate them, you will see him truly become unhinged.’
That’s what Omarosa Manigault Newman, reality TV star turned Trump aide, had to say in an interview with MSNBC on Saturday.
Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner both serve as senior advisers to the president. Trump’s sons Donald Jr. and Eric oversee Trump’s personal business.
“[Cohen] knows everything about this family,” Manigault Newman said. “He’s going to share, as the documents revealed, information about possible insurance fraud, tax fraud, the inner workings of their deal with the Trump Moscow.”
Manigault Newman, of course, was fired from her role at the White House at the end of 2017 and subsequently slammed the president in her book, “Unhinged.”
Cohen, once referred to by Trump as a “rat,” is expected to start a three-year prison sentence in May.