Today's stocks to watch in the news include BlackBerry Ltd (BBRY), City National Corp (CYN), and Logitech International SA (USA) (LOGI)
U.S. equities appear ready to rally, after the European Central Bank (ECB) unveiled a larger-than-expected quantitative easing plan. In company news, today's stocks to watch include Passport parent BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY), financial firm City National Corp (NYSE:CYN), and hardware maker Logitech International SA (USA) (NASDAQ:LOGI).
- Despite both companies previously denying a potential takeover, Samsung is reportedly still in hot pursuit of BBRY. As such, shares of the latter are pointed more than 5% higher ahead of the bell. Technically speaking, BlackBerry Ltd has had a nice run of late, rallying 9.1% from its Dec. 19 intraday low of $9.10 to perch at $9.93, and touching a fresh annual high of $12.63 last week on the first round of buyout rumors. There's plenty of sideline cash available to help the stock's upward trek, too. Nearly one-quarter of BBRY's float is sold short, which would take approximately eight sessions to repurchase, at the equity's average daily trading level.
- Ahead of tonight's earnings report, CYN is up 18% in electronic trading on news that Royal Bank of Canada (NYSE:RY) has agreed to buy the company for roughly $5.4 billion. "City National serves high-net-worth and commercial-client segments in select high-growth markets, and represents a unique opportunity to complement and enhance our existing U.S. businesses," RY CEO David McKay said in a statement. This buyout-related bounce in City National Corp shares is a change of pace for a stock that's lost 8% year-over-year to sit at $74.57. Not surprisingly, the brokerage bunch has blazed a bearish path toward the equity, doling out 13 "hold" or worse ratings, versus just one "buy."
- Finally, LOGI reported better-than-expected earnings last night, and upped its profit outlook for 2015. On the charts, the stock has advanced almost 5% so far this year to rest at $14.09. If this technical trend continues, Logitech International SA (USA) could explode. With 12.1% of the equity's float dedicated to short interest, a capitulation by the bears could help push LOGI higher.