The Dow Jones Industrial Average is in the black for the first time in 2016, after plummeting more than 10% last month. The index rose 0.9% on Thursday to turn a fractional gain for the month. Commodities including gold, silver and oil all headed higher, helping materials and energy companies to take a step forward
Heading into Friday’s action, there are several stocks to highlight, including Adobe Systems Incorporated (NASDAQ:ADBE) and Columbia Pipeline Group Inc (NYSE:CPGX), which should be on the way up, and Aeropostale Inc (NYSE:ARO), which is set to crater in today’s trading session.
Here’s what you need to know:
Aeropostale Inc (ARO)
Aeropostale is on the clearance rack.
The teen retailer on Thursday evening said the board authorized management “to explore a full range of strategic and financial alternatives,” and one of those alternatives is putting the company up for sale.
This news, coupled with limp fourth-quarter results, had ARO shares bombing in Friday’s premarket trading to the tune of 40%.
Aeropostale flipped to a loss of 14 cents per share in the quarter, which was in line with analysts’ expectations. Revenues of $498 million were a significant tumble from $593.8 million in the year-ago quarter, and also off of Wall Street’s guidance of $519.69 million.
For the full fiscal year, sales were off 18% to $1.507 billion, and comps were off 8.6%.
ARO also closed 13 stores during the quarter.
Adobe Systems Incroporated (ADBE)
Shares of software company Adobe, however, were booming after ADBE revealed its fiscal first quarter fiscal report.
Adobe posted an increase in revenue of $1.38 billion, up 25% compared to the same quarter in 2015, surpassing Wall Street estimates of $1.34 billion. Net income tripled year-over-year to $254.3 million, and on an adjusted basis, EPS of 66 cents were up 50% year-over-year and topped analysts’ expectations of 61 cents.
ADBE also announced second-quarter guidance of EPS in the range of 64 cents and 70 cents on revenue between $1.365 billion and $1.415 billion.
Adobe was set to open 7% higher on Friday.
Columbia Pipeline Group Inc (CPGX)
Columbia Pipeline Group saw its shares soar in after-hours trading Thursday as news broke of TransCanada Corporation (NYSE:TRP) acquiring the company in a deal valued at $13 billion, which includes the transference of $2.8 billion in debt.
The agreement will net TransCanada — an energy infrastructure company based in Canada — control of 57,000 miles of natural gas pipeline across North America.
“This transaction delivers tremendous value to our shareholders and places CPG within a leading energy platform that can maximize the value of our strategic positioning and deep inventory of transformational growth projects,” Columbia Pipeline CEO Robert Skaggs, Jr. said.
TransCanada said the acquisition will amount to $25.50 per share in cash. The deal is slated to close in the second half of 2016.
CPGX stock was up 5% in Friday’s premarket trading.
