Thursday’s Pre-Market: Here’s What You Need To Know Before The Market Opens

U.S. stock futures ticked down in Thursday’s pre-market trading session, pointing to more losses at the opening bell. Futures tied to all three of the major U.S. stock indexes traded in negative territory amid mixed COVID-19 news.  

Retailer L Brands jumped 14.7% in Wednesday’s after-hours session following its upbeat Q3 print. Due to continued strength in its Bath & Body Works brand and a significant improvement in the performance of Victoria’s Secret, adjusted EPS grew 55.5% year-over-year to $1.13. This figure came in well above the $0.09 consensus estimate. After the earnings release, Jefferies analyst Randal Konik upgraded L Brands to Hold from Sell and increased the price target to $33 from $20, saying that Victoria’s Secret and Pink brand sales and margins have “collapsed” over the last four years, and thus, his bearish thesis has “largely played out.”  

Shares of Twitter ticked down in pre-market trading on Thursday on its announcement that it needs to slow down the rollout of its disappearing tweets tool ‘Fleets’ to fix performance issues, according to a tweet by the company’s support team. The feature had only been launched on November 17. “We’re slowing down the rollout of Fleets to fix some performance and stability problems. If you don’t have the feature yet, you may not get it for a few more days… We love that so many people are using Fleets and want to ensure we’re providing the best experience for everyone,” the company’s support team said. 

As for other tech news, Nvidia posted better-than-expected Q3 results, driven by the robust sales of its chips used in gaming consoles and data centers. However, the semiconductor company expects Q4 data center revenue to drop sequentially. In response to the guidance, shares fell 2% in extended trading on Wednesday. “NVIDIA is firing on all cylinders, achieving record revenues in Gaming, Data Center and overall… The new NVIDIA GeForce RTX GPU provides our largest-ever generational leap and demand is overwhelming. NVIDIA RTX has made ray tracing the new standard in gaming,” CEO Jensen Huang stated. 

Shares of smart speaker company Sonos popped 23% in Wednesday’s extended trading session following its estimate-beating fourth quarter. Revenue jumped 16% to $339.8 million, surpassing analysts’ $299 million projection. The growth was driven by direct-to-consumer sales, which climbed 67% higher year-over-year. Merrill Lynch analyst John Babcock recently upgraded the stock to Buy from Hold and raised the price target to $18 from $17.50, arguing Sonos “continues to have several products on backorder including its Arc and Sub products that were just launched in June, suggesting still strong demand even as backlogs are off peak levels.”  

Meanwhile, Keysight Technologies’ Q4 print exceeded expectations thanks to strong demand for next-generation commercial communications technologies and semiconductor measurement tools, with increased global aerospace defense and government investments also bolstering its quarterly performance. Revenue gained 9% to reach $1.22 billion, above the $1.18 billion consensus estimate. Adjusted EPS of $1.62 also topped analysts’ $1.46 forecast. 

Shares of Palantir Technologies surged 1.8% in after-hours trading on Wednesday after it revealed it has been selected by the U.S. Army to receive one of two prototype contracts to accelerate the army’s network modernization. The contract marks the first time its Gotham software will be integrated with the army’s latest mission command software application, called the Command Post Computing Environment (CPCE). “We’re excited to partner on this important mission to modernize the army’s mission command capabilities,” Palantir’s Doug Philippone commented.