The U.S. government plans on purchasing 100 million doses Moderna's experimental coronavirus vaccine
Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJI) are up over 210 points after U.S. President Donald Trump said after the bell on Tuesday that the government will purchase 100 million doses of an experimental COVID-19 vaccine from Moderna (MRNA) for a reported $1.5 billion. This optimism is propping up reopening bellwethers in the cruise and airline sectors, as well. Futures on the S&P 500 Index (SPX) are higher, just one day after the index, joined by the Dow, snapped a seven-day win streak. Meanwhile, Nasdaq-100 Index (NDX) futures are also pointing to sizable gains.
Continue reading for more on today's market, including:
5 Things You Need to Know Today
- The Cboe Options Exchange
(CBOE) saw over 1.8 million call contracts traded on Tuesday, and 834,510 million put
contracts. The single-session equity put/call ratio rose to 0.45, and the
21-day moving average fell to 0.46.
- Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) announced a 5-for-1 stock split in an effort to make its stock more accessible to employees and investors. Extra shares will be doled out on August 28 and will begin trading on a split-adjusted bases on the last day of August. As a result, TSLA is up 6.8% in pre-market trading.
- The shares of Target Corporation (NYSE:TGT) are up 1.6% ahead of the bell, after the stock was added to J.P. Morgan Securities' "Analyst Focus" list. The analyst forecast strong first-quarter comparable sales to sustain during the release of its second-quarter results.
- Investment advisory firm Lazard Ltd (NYSE:LAZ) reported $222.5 billion in assets under management as of July 31 -- adding $7.8 billion since last month. LAZ is trading right at fair market value before the open.
- Today investors will digest the consumer price index (CPI), and the Core CPI, along with the Organization for Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) monthly report. The Federal Budget is also due out. The earnings docket includes reports from Cisco, Lyft (LYFT), SmileDirectClub (SDC), and Wheaton Precious Metals.
Asian, European Markets Mixed as Investors Comb Through COVID-19 Updates, Economic Data
Markets in Asia ended mixed on Wednesday as investors looked to yesterday’s claims that Russia has developed the world’s first coronavirus treatment. The plunging price of gold is also moving overseas indexes. The Kospi in South Korea tacked on 0.6%, and the Nikkei in Japan added 0.4% -- brushing off an earnings miss from finance giant Softbank. Meanwhile, China’s Shanghai Composite lost 0.6%, and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 1.4%.
Over in Europe, the major bourses are mostly higher at midday, with the exception of the German Dax, which is now off 0.1%. In the U.K., traders are combing over a record 20.4% second-quarter contraction in the economy, as well as an 8.7% rebound in June. The London FTSE 100 was last seen up 1.3%, while the French CAC 40 is 0.4% higher by the midway mark.