All three major indexes are coming off fresh record closes
Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJI) futures are pointed over 80 points lower this morning, after all three major indexes notched record closes following Friday's session. S&P 500 Index (SPX) futures are modestly in the red as well, while the Nasdaq Composite (IXIC) is looking to open just above fair value. Eyes are still on the COVID-19 relief bill, after word that President Donald Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell are expected to back it, though this one does not include a second round of stimulus checks. Meanwhile, coronavirus hospitalizations continue to rise to record highs in the U.S., while elsewhere, the U.K. plans to start administering Pfizer (PFE) and BioNtech's (BNTX) vaccine tomorrow.
Continue reading for more on today's market, including:
- A major round-up of cannabis stocks for December.
- Impressive IPO's in the food delivery sector.
- Plus, CSCO inches lower amid major deal; KODK soars on loan clearance; and alleged Google violation pushes IAC lower.
5 Things You Need to Know Today
- The Cboe Options Exchange (CBOE) saw more than 2.3 million call contracts traded on Friday, and 913,902 put contracts. The single-session equity put/call ratio rose to 0.39 and the 21-day moving average stayed at 0.42.
- Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) is down 0.2% in pre-market trading, amid news that the company is buying U.K. cloud software company IMImobile in a cash deal of $730 million. Year-to-date, the equity is down 7.5%.
- Eastman Kodak (NYSE:KODK) is soaring up 72.6% before the bell, after federal regulators discovered no wrong-doing with its $765 million loan deal with the U.S. government, meant to fund the company's production of drug ingredients. Heading into today, the security is already up 61.9% year-to-date.
- IAC (NASDAQ:IAC) is down 3% in electronic trading, after Alphabet (GOOGL) owned Google removed several of its browser extensions, citing "policy violations," and making it known they are looking into enforcement options. In the past nine months, IAC is up 124.1%.
- Today will start the week off slow with consumer credit data on deck.
Brexit Trade Deal Talks Weigh on European Stocks
Asian markets were mixed today, despite COVID-19 vaccine rollouts and renewed U.S. stimulus talks giving investor sentiment a boost. Elsewhere, Singapore’s major bank stocks fell. Nonetheless, South Korea’s Kospi added 0.5%, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 1.2%, and China’s Shanghai Composite and Japan’s Nikkei both dropped 0.8%.
Meanwhile, European stocks are mostly lower, as the United Kingdom and European Union (EU) make efforts to reach a post-Brexit trade deal by the end of the week, with issues such as fishing rights and competition rules yet to be resolved. Though London’s FTSE 100 was last seen up 0.4%, both France’s CAC and the German DAX have dropped 0.8% and 0.4%, respectively.