● 기업단신
Disney – Disney shares added more than 1% in early morning trading after the company elected independent director Mark Parker as Chairman of the board. It also opposed activist investor Nelson Peltz’s attempt to join the board as the two sides prepare for a proxy battle.
Bed Bath & Beyond — The retailer advanced 16% premarket, continuing to rally after a handful of meme stocks surged Wednesday. The stock surged almost 69% in Wednesday’s session.
American Airlines — The airline gained 5% after lifting its fourth quarter guidance, citing strong demand and high fares. American’s revenue forecast rose as much as 17% over 2019, up from a previous 11% to 13% increase. Other airlines gained in sympathy, with United, Delta and Southwest rising between 1.5% and 2%.
Logitech — The maker of mice and keyboards plummeted 16% after it missed earnings expectations for the recent quarter and slashed its sales outlook.
Netflix — The streaming giant gained 1.4% after an upgrade by Jeffries to buy from hold. The Wall Street firm, which also boosted its price target to $385 from $310, said the launch of its advertising-based offering and crackdown on password stealing will drive revenue and EBTIDA above estimates.
Anheuser-Busch InBev – Shares lost 2.5% premarket after UBS cut the brewer to sell, citing weakness in China and consumers reaching for spirits instead of beer.
Roku — The streaming stock slid 3.8% after Jefferies downgraded to an underperform rating, saying that consensus estimates are failing to account for a slowing advertising market.
Cleveland-Cliffs — The steel producer gained 2.6% following an upgrade by Morgan Stanley to overweight from an equal-weight rating, saying that shares can rally 35%.
KB Home — Shares dipped 3.4% after the homebuilder missed estimates for the recent quarter on the top and bottom lines. KB Home fourth-quarter earnings of $2.47 a share on $1.94 billion in revenue lagged analysts’ estimates of $2.86 per share on revenue of $1.98 billion.
Spotify – Shares of the audio streaming company fell by about 2% premarket after a downgrade to hold from buy at Jefferies, which said it expects Spotify’s growth margins to fall below Wall Street expectations in the next two years.
Cinemark – Shares gained 1.9% following an upgrade by analysts at JPMorgan to an overweight rating. The bank said that the movie chain looks attractive after its recent decline.
● Jobless Claims
● CPI
● 장전 상황
Stocks are little changed after December’s consumer prices report came in in line with economist expectations and showed inflation continues to cool.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 8 points, trading near flat. The S&P 500 dropped 0.1%. The Nasdaq Composite also lost 0.1%.
The December report showed a 0.1% dip in prices from November but was still 6.5% higher than a year prior. In November, the report showed a 0.1% monthly gain and an annual pace of 7.1%, according to Dow Jones.
The CPI without food and energy prices also came in in line with expectations, showing a month-over-month gain of 0.3%. The stripped-down index was 5.7% higher than a year ago in December.
●
● Proxy fight at Disney
Add “proxy fight” to Bob Iger’s already-staggering to-do list. After the bell Wednesday, Disney announced that its new chairman would be Mark Parker, a longtime board member and Nike’s executive chairman. But that wasn’t all. The entertainment giant got ahead of an announcement by activist investor Nelson Peltz’s Trian Fund Management, saying it had rejected Peltz’s attempt to join the board. Trian bought about $800 million Disney stock about two months ago. On Wednesday, Peltz said Disney had “lost its way” and that he wants Disney to become more cost efficient. Notably, though, Trian said it wasn’t looking to replace Iger, despite Peltz’s reported skepticism about the executive’s return to Disney. “Trian’s objective is to create sustainable, long-term value at Disney by working WITH Bob Iger and the Disney Board,” the firm said.
● The US plans to impose a cap on the price of Russian refined oil products.
This kind of sanction probably won’t have much of an impact—either on gasoline prices or Russia’s oil revenues.
* 필자의 생각: 인도부터 설득을 시켜야…그데 될까? *^
● Bed Bath & Body
Bed Bath & Beyond is probably on the brink of bankruptcy, AMC Entertainment is struggling with a massive debt load and an environment that favors streaming over theaters, and GameStop is, well, GameStop. But that didn’t stop their shares from popping in what felt like a last-gasp meme stock rally Wednesday. Bed Bath & Beyond, whose market cap was under $150 million earlier this week, surged the most – 68%. Heading into Thursday morning, its market value stands at more than $307 million, even as the company rapidly burns through cash, runs out of merchandise to sell and loses customers. “We don’t love the strength in nonsense stocks like AMC, CVNA, GME, BBBY, PRTY, etc.,” said Adam Crisafulli, founder of market commentary firm Vital Knowledge. “This just means people are blindly chasing.”
● Starbucks toughens return to office policy
Corporate workers at Starbucks will soon be required to return to their offices at least three days a week, CEO Howard Schultz told employees in a memo. Office workers were expected to come in once or twice a week, but badge swpe data showed employees weren’t living up to that request, according to Schultz. The coffee chain is the latest major company to issue a stricter return-to-office policy. Earlier this week, for instance, Disney’s Bob Iger told workers they needed to return to offices at least four days a week.
* 필자의 생각: 당연한거 아냐? 게다가 일주일에 두세번인데 설마 이걸 싫다고…(실제로 다른 회사는 그런 것들 많음) 지가 무슨 사장도 아니고 대주주도 아닌, 이걸 안된다고 버티는 것들이 더 이상한거지…
● BELARUS WON’T SEND MOVIE PIRATES TO THE PLANK
Belarus has just passed a law legalizing digital piracy for the next two years, but with some caveats. The new legislation will allow the use of intellectual property, including movies, music, and software, but only from countries “unfriendly” to the Belarusian regime.
The target of the new policy is undoubtedly the US, who has sanctioned Belarus in the past for its authoritarian government and human rights record, and more recently for aligning itself with Russia following the invasion of Ukraine.
The question is what repercussions, if any, this new law will provoke, and how Belarus will implement the policy. Though it may be intended as an act of economic warfare, it could also just be a whole lot of cutlass rattling.
