Oil fell on reports of rising inventories and traders were skittish about riskier assets ahead of the August jobs report due out Friday. The result was a largely down day across Wall Street. The S&P 500 lost 0.24%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average shed 0.29% and the Nasdaq Composite declined 0.19%.
While many stocks slipped on Wednesday, a few stocks managed to slip away with a “W.” Bob Evans Farms Inc (NASDAQ:BOBE), Infoblox Inc (NYSE:BLOX) and Twitter Inc (NYSE:TWTR) all finished in the black.
Let’s take a look at why.
Bob Evans Farms Inc (BOBE)
BOBE shares climbed almost 6% on more than 12 times the average daily volume after the restaurant operator delivered solid quarterly earnings and a strong outlook for the full year.
Ohio-based Bob Evans reported fiscal first-quarter earnings of 48 cents a share on sales of $306.3 million. While the top line did fall short of estimates for $310.92 million, that earnings figure was 4 cents better than the consensus expectation.
Looking ahead, BOBE forecast full year EPS of $2.05 to $2.20 per share on sales of $1.28 billion to $1.33 billion.
Facing pressure from an activist investor, Bob Evans CEO Saed Mohseni said the company is considering all options. Some believe those options include a sale or spinoff of the company’s packaged foods unit.
Infoblox Inc (BLOX)
Shares of network security provider Infoblox had a similar day, improving by more than 6% on high volume. BLOX, however, was up on M&A talk rather than earnings. California-based Infoblox reportedly has received interest from several private equity firms.
As is the case with Bob Evans, Infoblox has come under pressure from an activist investor to make moves to increase shareholder value.
“Thoma Bravo LLC, which had approached the company earlier this year about a potential acquisition, is one of the buyout firms that are participating in an auction for Infoblox, the people said this week, cautioning that no deal is certain,” Reuters reported. Specific suitors for BLOX were not mentioned in the Reuters piece.
With Wednesday’s games, BLOX shares are up about 17% year-to-date.
Twitter Inc (TWTR)
TWTR stock advanced 4.6% on above-average volume on unsubstantiated rumors (again) that the company could be up for the taking. Twitter, one of the largest social media players, is frequently mentioned as a potential takeover target.
Sparking Wednesday’s speculation: Co-founder Evan Williams said in an interview that the company’s board had to weigh a potential sale should an opportunity arise. Of course, as a board member, one could say that about anything that might enrich shareholders.
Google parent Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG, NASDAQ:GOOGL) is frequently mentioned as a possible suitor for Twitter.
Despite the company’s gains on Wednesday, TWTR shares remain down 17% in 2016.
As of this writing, Todd Shriber did not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities.
