After taking a breather, U.S. stock futures surged in pre-market trading on Wednesday on positive data for Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine. Dow Jones Industrial Average futures added 130 points, or 0.4%. Additionally, S&P 500 futures gained 0.3% and Nasdaq 100 futures traded in positive territory.
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Johnson & Johnson expects to have all of the necessary data to file for U.S. authorization for its experimental COVID-19 vaccine by February or earlier, the company’s chief scientist Paul Stoffels told Reuters. According to Stoffels, JNJ is recruiting over 1,000 people per day for the late-stage trial of its COVID-19 vaccine candidate. “By the end of the year or around the end of the year, we should have 60,000 people in the study… And efficacy endpoint should be there in the first few weeks or months, January or February, of the new year,” the chief scientist said.
Meanwhile, Beyond Meat launched its meatless minced pork product in China, as the plant-based meat company believes the region will be an important market in the years to come. Beyond Pork, a plant-based ground pork with roughly 50% less saturated and total fat than traditional 70/30 ground pork, was specifically designed for the Asian market. Initially, Beyond Pork will be available at five popular restaurants in Shanghai, offering dishes like spicy bolognese and shiitake wonton noodles.
Norwegian Cruise Line shares were down 5.5% in Wednesday’s pre-market trading session after it announced a secondary offering of 40 million common shares. The offering was priced at $20.80 per share, reflecting a 5.7% discount to the stock’s closing price on November 17. According to management, the funds generated will be used for general corporate purposes, with the offering expected to close on November 20.
On the corporate earnings front, Nio’s Q3 revenues increased 146.4% to $666.6 million year-over-year and surpassed the $664 million consensus estimate, thanks to record deliveries of its electric vehicles. It reported an adjusted loss of $0.12 per ADS (American depository share), but this narrowed from the $0.33 loss in the prior-year quarter and exceed the Street’s $0.18 call.
Shares of Walmart ticked up in pre-market trading on Wednesday following its better-than-expected Q3 earnings release. EPS of $1.34 beat the $1.18 consensus estimate and came in well above the $1.16 reported in the prior-year quarter. Revenue of $134.7 billion grew 5.2% year-over-year and exceeded the Street’s $132.2 billion estimate, thanks to a surge in online demand amid the pandemic. In response, Oppenheimer analyst Rupesh Parikh increased the price target to $165 (10.5% upside potential) from $152 and maintained a Buy rating, noting, “WMT shares are still positioned for outperformance, but see more of a grind higher from here. Ongoing benefits from WMT’s e-commerce investments, tailwinds from continued increases in at-home food consumption, and retailer liquidations suggest the potential for market share gains to persist.”
In other earnings news, Kohl’s shares jumped 11.6% on Tuesday as the retailer posted an adjusted EPS of $0.01 for the third quarter, handily beating analysts’ estimate of a loss per share of $0.43. That said, EPS declined 99% year-over-year as revenue (net sales plus other revenue) fell 14% to $3.98 billion and expenses increased. Comparable sales also dropped 13.3% in the quarter. Following the earnings release, Guggenheim analyst Robert Drbul said, “We believe the company will benefit from its off-mall positioning and strong national brand offering over the long term as store closures (particularly mall-based) materialize in coming years due to COVID-19.”
As for Home Depot, it reported Q3 EPS of $3.18, which surged 25.7% year-over-year and beat the Street’s estimate of $3.08, benefiting from demand for home improvement products amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Additionally, its top-line climbed due to a 24.1% spike in comparable store sales. “The third quarter was another exceptional quarter for The Home Depot as we saw the continuation of outsized demand for home improvement projects, which has led to sales growth of more than $15 billion through the first nine months of the year,” CEO Craig Menear commented.
