• December Housing Starts are due out at 8:30 a.m. EST and is expected to rise to 1,430,000 from 1,417,000.
• December Philadelphia Fed Manufacturing Index is due out at 8:30 a.m. EST and to improve to -8.0 from -10.50.
• Federal Reserve Atlanta President Raphael Bostic 7:30 a.m. EST and  12:05 p.m. EST

• IPOs Priced or News:
  • Palmer Square Capital BDC Inc. (PSBD) Prices Initial Public Offering.
• New SPACs launched/News: None of note.
• Secondaries Priced:
  • IMTX: Prices $175 Million offering. 15.9 million shares at $11 per share.
  • SURG: Announces Pricing of $15 Million Public Offering.
  • TALO: Prices offering of 30.0 million shares of common stock for gross proceeds of $351.0 million.
  • VRDN: Prices offering of 7,142,858 shares of common stock at $21.00 per share.
• Notes Priced of note:
  • EQT: Pricing of $750 Million of New Senior Notes.
  • RWT: Prices $60.0 Million Senior Notes Offering.
• Common Stock filings/Notes:
  • CATX: Proposed Public Offering. (Oppenheimer and B. Riley Bookmanagers)
  • CETX: Filed Form S-1.. Filed to sell common stock and warrants.
  • IMTX: Announces proposed public offering of its ordinary shares. (Jefferies, BAC and Leerink Bookmanagers)
  • PLUG: Enters into an At Market Issuance Sales Agreement to sell shares of its common stock having an aggregate offering price of up to $1.0 billion.
  • SURG: Proposed Public Offering. (Titan Partners Bookmanager)
  • TALO: Commencement of Underwritten Public Offering of Common Stock. $300.0 million of shares. (JPM, GS and Mizuho bookmanager)
  • VRDN: Proposed Underwritten Public Offering of Common Stock and Preferred Stock. (Jefferies and Leerink Bookmanagers)
• Direct Offering: None of note.
• Selling Shareholders of note:
  • SND – See Mixed Shelf
• Private Placement of Public Entity (PIPE):
  • CGC: Announces upsized $35 million private placement.
• Mixed Shelf Offerings:
  • ROI: Filed Form S-3.. $25,000,000 Mixed Shelf.
  • SND: Form S-3 Filed .. $200,000,000 Mixed Shelf — 8,158,754 Shares Common Stock Offered by the Selling Stockholders.
• Debt/Credit Filing and Notes: None of note.
• Tender Offer:
  • SVA: Board of Directors Unanimously Rejects an Unsolicited Partial Tender Offer.
• Convertible Offering & Notes Filed:
  • MMYT: Announces Repurchase Right Notification for 0.00% Convertible Senior Notes due 2028.
  • WGO: To offer $300 million aggregate principal amount of convertible senior notes due 2030.

Capital Raise Summary From The TradeXchange, bringing traders and investors real time news and Squawk Box, and other sources.

News After The Close :

• After Hours Movers: 
  • MRAI: +52% Insider Purchase
  • HTZ: +6% Upgraded to OVERWEIGHT @ MS
  • BTU: +6% to Join S&P SmallCap 600
  • RCM: +3.5% Completes Acquisition of Acclara
  • GRAB: +3% Upgraded to OVERWEIGHT @ JPM
  • ARAV: -53% to Delist from The Nasdaq Stock Market
  • PLUG: -15% Form 8K.. entered into an At Market Issuance Sales Agreement
  • ROI: -12% Filed Form S-3.. $25,000,000 Mixed Shelf
  • DFS: -8% Earnings
  • SURG: -7.5% Proposed Public Offering
  • TALO: -5% Public Offering of Common Stock
  • ELF: -2.5% to Join S&P MidCap 400
  • AA: -2% Earnings
• News Items After the Close:
  • Stocks making the biggest moves after hours: DFS, AA, TALO, PLUG, FUL (CNBC)
  • Apple (AAPL) to Sell Watches Without Oxygen Feature After Legal Setback. (Bloomberg)
  • Apple’s (AAPL) Vision Pro Won’t Launch With Netflix (NFLX) App. (Bloomberg)
  • Discover (DFS) shares drop as company sets aside an extra $1 billion to guard against souring credit. (MarketWatch)
  • Sheryl Sandberg says she’s leaving META’s board. (CNBC)
  • Plug Power’s (PLUG) plan to sell stock is latest blow amid liquidity, supply challenges. (MarketWatch)
  • MSCI categorically refutes the claims from short-seller report released today. (Reuters)
  • Google’s (GOOGL) CEO Sundar Pichai indicates more job cuts in 2024, focusing on AI investments. In a recent memo, he highlighted the need for ‘tough choices’ to achieve ‘ambitious goals,’ hinting at role eliminations and organizational streamlining. (CNBC)
  • Mercury (MRCY) initiated workforce reduction to eliminate approximately 100 positions.

• Exchange/Listing/Company Reorg and Personnel News:
  • Index Changes: e.l.f. Beauty (ELF) to join S&P MidCap 400; Peabody Energy (BTU) to join S&P SmallCap 600.
  • Allbirds (BIRD) Announces Executive Leadership Appointments.
  • Goodyear (GT) to Name Stellantis Exec as CEO After Elliott Push. (Bloomberg)
  • Mitek Systems (MITK) announces extension of Nasdaq Stay and hearing date.
  • Origin Agritech (SEED) Announces Appeal of Nasdaq Delisting Letter.
  • Quantum (QMCO) Announces Update on Plan to Regain Nasdaq Compliance and Delayed Form 10-Q Filing.
  • Sarcos (STRC) Welcomes Back Co-Founder and Former CEO Ben Wolff to Lead Company Following Pivot to Industrial AI Software Focus.
  • Target (TGT) Announces Michael Fiddelke as Chief Operating Officer.
• Buyback Announcements or News: 
  • ONEOK (OKE) authorizes $2 billion share repurchase program. (see Dividends)
• Stock Splits or News:
  • Nuvve (NVVE) announces 1-for-40 reverse stock split.
  • PBLA to trade reverse stock split 1/20  price today.
  • Processa Pharmaceuticals (PCSA) to Effect a 1-for-20 Reverse Stock Split.
• Dividends Announcements or News: 
  • Fastenal (FAST) increases quarterly cash dividend to $0.39 per share from $0.35 per share.
  • ONEOK (OKE) increases quarterly cash dividend 3.7% to $0.99 per share from $0.955 per share.
• Insider Sales Of Note: None of note.

What’s Happening This Morning: Futures value reflects the change with fair value.

Sector Action – (1/3/6/12/YTD Updated Weekly with Monday release):  

• Daily Positive Sectors: None of note.
• Daily Negative Sectors: Real Estate, Utilities, Basic Materials, Energy, Consumer Cyclical, Industrials, Communication Services, Financial of note.
• One Month Winners: Healthcare, Communication Services, and Real Estate of note.
• Three Month Winners: Real Estate, Technology, and Financial of note.
• Six Month Winners: Communication Services, Financial, and Technology of note.
• Twelve Month Winners: Technology, Communication Services, Consumer Cyclicals and Industrials of note.
• Year to Date Winners:  Healthcare, Communication Services, and Consumer Defensive of note.

U.S. stock indexes fell deeper into negative territory for 2024 as investors dialed back their expectations for how quickly the Federal Reserve might start cutting interest rates.  The S&P 500 fell 0.6% while the Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 0.3%, or about 94 points. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite declined 0.6%. The S&P 500 is down 0.6% in 2024, while the Dow and Nasdaq are off 1.1% and 1%, respectively.  The yield on the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury note, meanwhile, rose to 4.103%, its highest 3 p.m. level in more than a month, from 4.064% on Tuesday.  (WSJ – edited by QPI)

Upcoming Earnings Of Note: (From Chartroom Software – sorted by market cap, highest to lowest with most visible names)

• Gap Up: RAMP +8%, BTU +6%, TSM +5%, NGL +5%, IMTX +5%, LUXH +5% of note.
• Gap Down: PLUG -16%, DFS -11%, BTMD -7%, WTFC -7%, TALO -5% of note.

Insider Action: PBF, WVE sees Insider buying with dumb short selling.  No stock sees Insider buying with smart short sellers.

Rags & Mags: Repeated stories from prior days never listed, i.e. “rehashed news”. Sorted by Global, U.S. and stock specific.

• What You Need To Know To Start Your Day. (Bloomberg)
• 5 Things To Know Before the Stock Market Opens Today. (CNBC)
• Bloomberg Lead Story: Pakistan’s Army strikes back at Iranas Both Sides Urge Calm.  (Bloomberg)
• Bloomberg  Most Shared Story: Blinken’s return from Davos delayed after plane breaks down.  (Bloomberg)
• Stocks and Futures rebound as chipmakers climb: Markets Wrap. (Bloomberg)
• Why Jamie Dimon should have more faith in the U.S. (Barron’s)
• Humana (HUM) cuts 2024 outlook on higher Medicare costs. (Bloomberg)
• Birkenstock (BIRK) sees fast growth in first quarter since IPO. (Bloomberg)
• Bloomberg Odd Lots:  US Oil is booming and its upending global makets. (Podcast)
• NPR Marketplace: Spot Bitcoin investment funds to stoke miners’ massive energy use.  (Podcast)
• NY Times Daily: What the Houthis really want? (Podcast)

Moving Average Update:  Score notches down to 57% from 68%.

Geopolitical: 

M&A Activity and News: 

• biote Corp. (BTMD) to acquire F.H. Investments, Inc., d/b/a Asteria Health, a privately held 503B manufacturer of compounded bioidentical hormones; purchase price is $8.5 million
• Dover (DOV) acquires Transchem Group.
• LiveRamp (RAMP) to Acquire Habu to accelerate the power of data collaboration in a cash and stock transaction valued at approximately $200 million.
• Taro Pharm (TARO) agrees to be acquired by Sun Pharma for $43 per share.

Top Tier Sell-side Upgrades & Downgrades:

The recommendations listed below in this “Upgrade/Downgrade” section are compiled from what we believe are Tier I, II and III firms. Recommendations posted are taken from a variety of sources each day and we only post upgrades or significant initiations as well as downgrades to underweight or sell. The purpose of this posting is to make the reader aware of market-moving recommendations. None of these recommendations should be interpreted as actual recommendations from CAPIS or its employees.

Today’s Upgrades and Downgrades:

Previous Day’s Upgrades and Downgrades: