Profit-taking and some weak earnings reports from big-name airline and technology companies weighed on stocks today. Gold rebounded and the euro faltered after the European Central Bank indicated that it could add to its monetary stimulus efforts later this year.
The S&P 500 lost 0.36% while the Dow Jones Industrial Average declined 0.42%, its first loss in 10 sessions. The Nasdaq Composite fell 0.31%.
On a rough day for stocks, earnings and a takeover lifted eBay Inc (NASDAQ:EBAY), QUALCOMM, Inc. (NASDAQ:QCOM) and Relypsa Inc (NASDAQ:RLYP) to the top stocks of the day club.
eBay Inc (EBAY)
eBay Inc, the online auction site, soared nearly 11% to a record high on volume that was more than triple the daily average after the company issued bullish full-year profit and revenue guidance.
For the full year, EBAY expects to earn $1.85 to $1.90 per share on sales of $8.85 billion to $8.95 billion. Analysts were expecting EBAY to earn $1.86 per share on sales of $8.8 billion.
RBC Capital Markets analyst Mark Mahaney boosted his price target on EBAY to $31 from $28 while Cowen analyst John Blackledge lifted his price target on EBAY shares to $30 from $24.
EBAY also added $2.5 billion to its share repurchase program.
Qualcomm, Inc. (QCOM)
Shares of semiconductor giant Qualcomm, Inc. jumped 7.4% on turnover that was more than triple the daily average after the company posted fiscal third-quarter results that beat Wall Street estimates. QCOM posted EPS of $1.16 on $6.03 billion in revenue during its fiscal third quarter. Analysts expected QCOM to earn 97 cents on revenue of $5.58 billion.
QCOM’s technology licensing unit notched revenue of $2.04 billion, above the $1.82 billion analysts expected. In an interview with CNBC, Qualcomm CEO Steve Mollenkopf said demand for higher-end chips from technologies such as virtual reality could be beneficial to QCOM going forward.
Mollenkopf added in the CNBC interview that “China will continue to be an important component of the growth story for QCOM moving forward.”
Relypsa Inc (RLYP)
Shares of biopharmaceuticals firm Relypsa Inc surged nearly 59% on volume that was more than 12 times the daily average after Galenica Group agreed to buy RLYP for $1.53 billion.
Switzerland-based Galenica Group already had a relationship with RLYP.
The Swiss company is offering $32 per RLYP share, a 59% premium to where the stock closed yesterday. Galenica’s deal for RLYP is expected to close in the current quarter.
At the time of this writing, Todd Shriber did not own any of the aforementioned securities.
