CAPIS Morning Note – 12/12/24: NASDAQ Composite Breaks 20,000 on Wednesday.

• IPOs For The Week: ALEH, FTRK, HIT, MIMI, MTRS, NTCL, PHH, YSXT
• New IPOs/SPACs launched/News: None of note.
• IPOs Filed/Priced: None of note.
• Secondaries Filed or Priced:
  • BCTX: Pricing of $5.5 Million Public Offering 7,400,000 common shares @$0.75.
  • FISI: Pricing of Common Stock Offering.. 4M @$25.
• Notes Priced:
  • DBD: Prices Offering of Senior Secured Notes.
  • MAA: Pricing of Senior Unsecured Notes Offering.
• Direct Offering: None of note.
• Exchangeable Subordinate Voting Shares: None of note.
• Selling Shareholders of note:
  • CHWY: announces $500 million public offering of Class A common stock by selling stockholder Buddy Chester.
  • ORA: Public Offering of Common Stock on Behalf of Stockholder ORIX Corporation. (see Mixed Shelf too)
  • QNRX: FORM S-1 – Up to 19,230,769 Ordinary Shares Represented by Ameri.
• Mixed Shelf Offerings:
  • BTDR files $1.0 billion mixed shelf securities offering.
  • BNED  files $40 million mixed shelf securities offering. 
  • ORA: FORM S-3ASR – Mixed Shelf Offering – 6,676,077 Shares of Common Stock.
• PIPE: None of note.
• Convertible Offerings & Notes Filed: None of note.

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

Biggest Movers Up & Down After The Close:

• Movers Up: DBVT +25%, KR +2.9%, BTDR +2.6% of note. 
• Movers Down:  ADBE -8.4%, NDSN -5.8%, CMTL -5.2%,  OXM -4.2%, CHWY -2.7%, CORT -2.4% of note.

News After The Close:

• • 10-K Delays – CMTL of note.
  • AB announces that preliminary assets under management increased to $813 billion during November 2024 from $793 billion last month.
  • HOOD reports November 2024 operating data; Assets Under Custody (AUC) up 22% from October to $195 billion.
  •  MSFT expects to record impairment charge of approximately $800 million in 2Q25 due to General Motors’ (GM) intent to realign its autonomous driving strategy.
  •  Kroger (KR) terminates merger agreement with Albertsons (ACI), approves new $7.5 billion share repurchase program, and announces merger debt redemption.
  • Eldorado Gold (EGO) releases updated mineral reserve and mineral resource statement; 2024 Gold Mineral Reserves Increased to 11.9 Million Oz with M&I Gold Mineral Resources of 22.0 million Oz; inaugural mineral reserve declared at Ormaque; Outline of 2025 reporting schedule. 
  • LDOS awarded $987 million U.S. Air Force contract.
  • BAESY awarded $656 million U.S. Army contract.

Buybacks or Repurchases: 

• FLXS approves a new $30 million share repurchase program.  
• CHWY also to add $50 million share repurchase.
• NOC authorizes an additional $3.0 billion share repurchase program, increasing outstanding authorized amount to approximately $4.2 billion.

Exchange/Listing/Company Reorg and Personnel News:

• KO appoints Henrique Braun as Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer, effective Jan. 1, 2025.
• VLY announces retirement of President Thomas Iadanza, effective June 2025.

• Stocks Ex Div Today: TSM VALE ADT AL BDC RYN MCY MDU MPW NSSC JACK CTO
• Stocks Ex Div Tomorrow: ADP, ALB, BR, CB, CCI, DVN, DLR, DPZ, GRMN, GILD, GPN, HCA, MSI, PSA, STX, TROW, TXT, TMO, VRSK, WMT, WMB
• HST announces a special dividend of $0.10 per share, payable on January 15, 2025, to stockholders of record as of December 31.

What’s Happening This Morning: (as of 7:46 a.m. EDT) Futures S&P 500 -11.44, NASDAQ -91.73, Dow Jones -28.56 and Russell 2000 -4.86. Europe is mixed with Asia is higher (NIKKEI and HSI +4.2%) ex Australia. Bonds are at 4.30% from 4.25% on the 10-Year. Crude Oil and Brent are higher with Natural Gas down 2.34%. Gold and Silver are lower and Copper edging up. The U.S. Dollar is slightly lower versus the Euro, lower against the Pound and lower against the Yen. Bitcoin is at $100,820 from $98,381.

• Daily Positive Sectors: Communication Services and Consumer Defensive of note.
• Daily Negative Sectors: Real Estate, Technology, Materials and Utilities of note.
• One Month Winners: Consumer Cyclicals, Financials, Industrials, Energy and Utilities of note.
• Three Month Winners: Consumer Cyclicals, Financials, Communication Services, Industrials, Utilities, Consumer Defensive and Technology of note.
• Six Month Winners: Financials, Real Estate, Utilities, Consumer Cyclical and Technology of note.
• Twelve Month WinnerMOmONTs: Financials, Technology, Industrials, Utilities and Communication Services note.
• Year to Date Winners:  Technology, Financials, Utilities, Communication Services and Industrials of note.

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

• Thursday After the Close: 

• Friday Before The Open: None of note

Notable Earnings of Note This Morning:

• Gap Up: AGL +3.52%, WLK +3.46%, UBER +3.25%, ACHC +3.16%, REXR +3.02%, CWEN +3.02%, CUBE +2.89%, CELH +2.82%, AS +2.68%, CNC +2.62%
• Gap Down: ADBE -11.29%, NDSN -6.23%, DRVN -5.59%, CIEN -5.34%, CERT -5.01%, CTVA -2.98%, VYX -2.95%, GD -2.49%, PVH -2.42%, AXS -2.32%

Insider Action: No stock sees Insider buying with dumb short selling. No stock see 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.

• Lead Story on Bloomberg:  China Signals More Fiscal Stimulus, Rate Cuts to Lift Growth. (Bloomberg)
• 5 Things to Know Before the Stock Market Opens (CNBC)
• Stocks Making The Biggest Moves: . (CNBC)
• Market Wrap: Stocks Slip as ECB, Fed Interest-Rate Cuts Priced. (Bloomberg)
• Police Investigate NYC ‘Wanted’ Posters of Finance Executives (Bloomberg)
• IPO investors are hopeful about 2025 after last major offering of this year prices on a high note. (CNBC)
• MicroStrategy shares could surge even higher if added to Nasdaq 100 on Friday, crypto analyst says. (MarketWatch)
• Bloomberg: The Big Take – Market-Moving Data Under Threat as Trump Returns to Washington. (Podcast)

M&A Activity and News:

• GIB signs an equity purchase agreement to merge operations with Daugherty, expands operations in multiple U.S. metro markets.

Moving Averages On Major Equity Indexes: Moves back up to 80% from 57%.

Meeting & Conferences 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.

• • Upgrades:  BEP, BEPC, ROK, PEP, MSCI, KO, KDP, CHTR
  • Downgrades:  AMPS, OTIS, HSY, GD