Overnight Summary: The S&P 500 closed Friday by 0.13% at 4514.02 from Thursday higher by 0.12% at 4508.24. The overnight high was hit at 4534 at 5:20 a.m. EST while the low was hit at 4520 at 1:20 p.m. EST. The range overnight was 14 points as of 7:10 a.m. EST. The 10-day average of the overnight range is at 14.20 from 14.70.  The average for May-October average was 22.06 from 20.96. Currently, the S&P 500 is higher by +3 points which is  +0.07% at 7:10 a.m. EST.

Breaking News: Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen to be interviewed on CNBC at the 8:00 a.m. EST hour.

Executive Summary:  This is a shortened week with markets closed Thursday for Thanksgiving and Friday is a shortened trading day. Bias is higher on a seasonal basis.

• • Top story is OpenAI and its founder going to Microsoft
  • Treasury Secretary Yellen to given interview to CNBC.
  • Hedge Fund notable Jim Chanos to close hedge fund as short and long/short managers struggle.
  • Argentina’s election brings country closer to U.S.
  • The U.S. government avoids a shutdown.

Earnings Out After The Close: 

• IPOs Priced or News:  None of note.
• New SPACs launched/News:
  • Churchill Capital Corp VI (CCVI) Will Redeem Its Public Shares and Will Not Consummate an Initial Business Combination.
  • Fat Projects Acquisition Corp (FATP) Announces Termination of Business Combination Agreement with Avanseus and Subsequent Liquidation.
  • World View and Leo Holdings Corp. II (LHC) Intend to Mutually Agree to Terminate Business Combination Agreement.
  • Nabors Energy Transition Corp. (NETC) Announces Extension of Deadline to Complete Business Combination.
• Secondaries Priced: None of note.
• Notes Priced of note:
  • AAL: Announces Pricing of Senior Secured Notes.
  • LGIH: Announces Pricing of $400 Million of Unsecured Senior Notes due 2028.
• Common Stock filings/Notes: None of note.
• Direct Offering: None of note.
• Selling Shareholders of note:
  • BLFS: Files for 927,165 share common stock offering by selling shareholder; also files for $75 mln mixed securities shelf offering.
  • GPCR: Files for 8,006,405 ADS offering by selling shareholders.
  • LUXH: Files for 2 million share common stock offering by selling shareholder.
  • OSCR: Announces that Mark Bertolini’s Foundation and Deerfield Management have entered into an agreement with a selling shareholder to purchase shares of Oscar Health
  • SPPL: Filed Form F-3.. 2,500,000 Ordinary Shares by selling shareholders.
• Private Placement of Public Entity (PIPE): None of note.
• Mixed Shelf Offerings:
  • BLFS: see Selling Shareholders.
  • CATX: $200,000,000 Mixed Shelf.
  • FRAF: Filed Form S-3..$100,000,000 Mixed Shelf.
  • MBOT: Filed Form S-3..$75,000,000 Mixed Shelf.
  • XGN: Filed Form S-3..$150,000,000 Mixed Shelf.
• Debt/Credit Filing and Notes:
  • BB: Announces Completion of Partial Debt Refinancing.
• Tender Offer: None of note.
• Convertible Offering & Notes Filed:
  • UBER: Announces Proposed $1.2 Billion Convertible Senior Notes Offering.

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

News After The Close and Over the Week:

• Weekly Wrap Up: Best and Worst performing large cap stocks:
  • Trading Up: SAVE 42%, AAOI 37%, LIND 33%, CHRS 33%, GPS 31%, M 31%, AMRC 30%, OMER 30%, PACB 29%, ESPR 29%, COMM 29%, STNE 29%, SONO 28%, CDNA 28%.
  • Trading Down: MOR -24%, PLCE -21%, NINE -16%, RILY -16%, FOSL -14%, SPB -13%, IEP -11%, MTRX -10%, AAP -10%, CSCO -9%, AMSWA -9%, NVAX -8%.
• News Items After the Close:
  • Openai:
    • MSFT: Three Senior Openai Researchers Resign As Crisis Deepens – (TheInformation)
    • OpenAI President Brockman Resigns Following CEO Firing (TheInformation)
  • Jim Chanos Short Seller Who Took On Enron And Tesla Tsla, To Close Hedge Funds And Return Investor Cash Chanos Manages Under $200 Million Today in the Hedge Fund, Down From $6 Billion In 2008 – (WSJ)
  • Disney (DIS), Warner Bros.(WBD), Comcast (CMCSA), Paramount Global (PARA) are the latest to pull ads from Elon Musk’s X. (MarketWatch)
  • Huntington Ingalls (HII) secures U.S. Navy contract with potential $185 Million value.
• News Items Over the Weekend:
  • The Score: Stocks That Defined the Week. TGT, BA, M, TSN, FSR, HD (WSJ)
  • Taiwan reported renewed Chinese military activity around the island on Sunday, with nine aircraft crossing the sensitive median line of the Taiwan Strait and warships carrying out “combat readiness patrols”.
  • OpenAI sage continues through the weekend:
    • OpenAI Investors Try to Get Sam Altman Back. (WSJ)
    • MSFT: Ousted OpenAI CEO Sam Altman joins Microsoft to lead advanced AI team.
  • The leader of General Motors’ (GM) self-driving car unit Cruise resigned Sunday as pressure continues over an incident last month in which a pedestrian was dragged beneath a robot car.
  • “We remain bullish on the $SPX, which we expect will consolidate .. for a few more days before resuming the Santa Claus rally .. We are still forecasting .. 4600 by the end of the year. A solid break above 4550 could signal a very good start for stocks in 2024.”  (Carl Q CNCB – Yardeni Research)
  • SPX: B of A: “.. 2024 Forecasts: .. soft landing in US & global economy, lower inflation, easier monetary policy, higher oil prices, lower US dollar, modest decline in bond yields, modest but broader upside in global equities.” ([Hartnett] Carl Q Cnbc )
  • SpaceX’s Starship progresses further on a second test flight before being destroyed intentionally.
  •  Barron’s:
    • Positive View: WMT, MAT, BBY, FCX of note.
    • Cautious View: CSCO, VTRS of note.
    • Mixed View: None of note.

• Erlanger Type 1 Short Squeezes and Type 4 Long Squeezes reporting earnings this week:

• Exchange/Listing/Company Reorg and Personnel News:
  • Delisting of Securities from The Nasdaq Stock Market.: Genesis Growth Tech Acquisition Corp.; Financial Strategies Acquisition Corp.; Kiromic BioPharma, Inc.; Infinity Pharmaceuticals, Inc.; Molekule Group, Inc.; EBET, Inc.; Shift Technologies, Inc.; Ontrak, Inc.; RVL Pharmaceuticals plc; Biocept, Inc.; Akumin Inc.; Appreciate Holdings, Inc.; Liberty TripAdvisor Holdings, Inc.; Tempo Automation Holdings, Inc.; Medicenna Therapeutics Corp.; RiceBran Technologies; and Acer Therapeutics Inc.
  • Aflac (AFL) Chairman and CEO Daniel Amos also named President.
  • ALBPS – Biophytis (BPTS) Announces Receipt of Nasdaq Notice.
  • Ault Alliance (AULT) Announces Notice of Noncompliance with NYSE American Listing Standards.
  • Brüush (BRSH) Receives Nasdaq Notification Regarding Minimum Bid Requirements.
  • Caravelle International Group (CACO) Announces Receipt of Nasdaq Notification and Outlines Compliance Plan.
  • Clearmind Medicine (CMND) Announces Receipt of Nasdaq Delisting Notice and Plan for Immediate Recompliance.
  • Centrus Energy (LEU) announces that Amir Vexler will succeed Daniel Poneman as Chief Executive Officer.
  • Greenbrook Tms (GBNH) Receives Nasdaq Delisting Notice And Intends To Appeal.
  • MedAvail (MDVL) Receives Nasdaq Notification of Non-Compliance Related to Delayed Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q.
  • NKLA: Form 8K.. On November 13, 2023, Anastasiya “Stasy” Pasterick, Chief Financial Officer (“CFO”) of Nikola Corporation (the “Company”), informed the Company that she is resigning from her position to pursue other opportunities. (MarketWatch)
  • Perdoceo Education (PRDO) appoints Todd Nelson as President and CEO; Andrew Hurst resigned.
  • Quantum (QMCO) Announces Notification from Nasdaq Related to Delayed Form 10-Q Filing.
  • Qorvo (QRVO) names Dr. Walden C. Rhines as Chair of the Board.
  • Scinai Immunotherapeutics (SCNI) Regains Compliance with Nasdaq’s Stockholders’ Equity Rule.
  • Secoo (SECO) Receives Delisting Notice from Nasdaq and Plans to Request Hearing.
  • TMBR: files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
  • Veradigm Inc. (MDRX) Receives Nasdaq Notice Regarding Delayed Form 10-Q.
• Buyback Announcements or News: 
  • Bowman (BWMN) Announces Authorization of New Share Repurchase Program.
  • Palo Alto Networks (PANW) increases share repurchase authorization by $316.7 million, bringing total authorization to $1 billion (MarketWatch)
  • Teck Resources (TECK) receives regulatory approval for share buy-back program.
• Stock Splits or News:
  • IFBD to reverse split today 1/20.
• Dividends Announcements or News: None of note.
• 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: Energy, Consumer Cyclical, Financial, Industrial of note.
• Daily Negative Sectors: Communication Services of note.
• One Month Winners: Technology, Consumer Defensive, Real Estate, Consumer Cyclical and Financials of note.
• Three Month Winners: Technology, Communication Services, and Financial of note.
• Six Month Winners: Technology, Communication Services, Consumer Cyclical, Energy of note.
• Twelve Month Winners: Technology, Communication Services, Consumer Cyclical and Industrials of note.
• Year to Date Winners:  Technology, Communication Services, Consumer Cyclical and Industrials of note.

U.S. investors’ appetite for risk has returned.   The S&P 500 rose 0.1% Friday, capping off a 2.2% gain for the week. The broad-based index, which booked a third straight weekly advance, has closed higher in 13 of the last 15 sessions. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was little changed Friday, while the Nasdaq Composite was up 0.1%.  Tuesday’s cooler-than-expected inflation report was the latest reason for investors to cheer, helping extend a furious November rally in which the S&P 500 has jumped 7.6%. Traders are betting the Federal Reserve’s rate-hike campaign is done for now and that inflation will head toward target levels without a steep recession—the elusive “soft landing.” Interest-rate derivatives now indicate that traders see a greater-than-50% chance of an interest-rate cut by the Fed’s May meeting.  (WSJ – edited by QPI)

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

• Gap Up: LUXH +5% of note.
• Gap Down: None of note.

Insider Action: EPSN, ALTG sees Insider buying with dumb short selling.  HHH, NRP, RPTX, GDRX 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.

• Five Things You Need To Know Before You Start Your Day. (Bloomberg)
• 5 Things To Know Before The Stock Market Opens. (CNBC)
• Bloomberg Lead Story: Microsoft Ends Weekend of OpenAI Drama With Coup of Its Own. (Bloomberg)
• Bloomberg Most Shared Story: Blackstone (BX) is Lead Bidder in Signature Bank Property Loan Sale. (Bloomberg)
• Populist Milei wins in Argentina, bringing country closer to the dollar. (CNBC)
• U.S. faces a more dangerous Axis of evil than we realize, Rep Cory Mills (R-FL). (Fox Business)
• Dollar extends decline, U.S. Equity Futures steady: Market Wrap. (Bloomberg)
• Who is the new OpenAI CEO, Emmett Shear? (CNBC)
• Elon Musk defends himself on X over antisemitic comments deepens. (Bloomberg)
• Cruise CEO Kyle Vogt resigns from GM owned robotaxi unit. (CNBC)
• NPR Morning Report Marketplace:   How is crypto doing in a post Sam Bankman-Fried world? (Podcast)
• NY Times The Daily: The New House Speaker avoided a shut down, can he avoid being ousted?  (Podcast)
• BBC Global News:   Israel says CCTV shows hostages at Gaza hospital. (Podcast) 
• Bloomberg: The Big Take: Shutdown averted, Trump legal battles and 2024 race for White House. (Podcast) `
• Wealthion:  How the Fed really works? (Podcast)

Moving Average Update:

• Score goes to 97% from 94%.

Geopolitical: 

M&A Activity and News: None of note.

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: