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- Top stocks to watch in today's opener 📈
Top stocks to watch in today's opener 📈
These stocks are running hot after the long weekend...
Chris Dinello
January 16, 2024
Good Morning!
It's Chris from Elite Trade Club, here to give you this morning's premarket trading news.
Welcome back from a long holiday weekend. Now, let's get ready to trade!
Markets 📈
Stocks closed Friday with mixed results, although the market’s benchmark indexes all ended the day within a half-point of where they began it.
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Index futures are ticking lower in early trading. S&P 500 contracts are currently showing a 0.3% loss.
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Premarket Highlights 🔎
💰 Bank Earnings Season: Midway Recap
As we await the earnings reports from Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, a review of the U.S.'s four largest banks - JPMorgan, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, and Citigroup - reveals some notable trends from their fourth-quarter results:
💵 Collective Earnings:
Together, these banks reported earnings of $104 billion in 2023, reflecting an 11% increase from the previous year.
🏦 Individual Banks:
JPMorgan Chase [JPM]: It witnessed a substantial increase in investment-banking fees, booking $1.65 billion for the quarter, a 13% hike from the previous year.
Wells Fargo [WFC]: While specific details weren't highlighted, Wells Fargo remains a significant player in the banking sector.
Bank of America [BAC]: Like JPMorgan, Bank of America also saw a rise in investment-banking fees.
Citigroup [C]: The bank reported a notable $1.8 billion loss in the fourth quarter and announced plans to cut 20,000 jobs.
Goldman Sachs [GS] has already reported this morning, and shares are gaining steam after the bank reported a 51% boost in quarterly profits compared to a year ago.
Bank earnings always have a huge influence on investor sentiment, and they provide valuable economic insights.
So far, it looks like the banking sector closed 2023 on a high note, with many reporting strong Q4 results. However, the outlook could change quickly if the Fed begins slashing rates in 2024.
What to Watch Today 👀
Earnings Season Continues
The holiday-shortened trading week kicks off with another busy week for quarterly earnings. Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs are headlining today’s docket, with PNC Financial and Interactive Brokers running close behind. With no major economic updates on today’s schedule, these earnings reports are likely to set the tone for the remainder of the trading week.
Featured Earnings 💲
Morgan Stanley [MS] ... AM
Goldman Sachs [GS] ... AM
PNC Financial Services [PNC] ... AM
Applied Digital [APLD] ... AM
Interactive Brokers [IBKR] ... PM
Pinnacle Financial Partners [PNFP] ... PM
Hancock Whitney [HWC] ...PM
Fulton Financial [FULT] ... PM
Progress Software [PRGS] ... PM
FB Financial [FBK] ... PM
Economy 🏗
Empire State manufacturing survey [Jan] ... 8:30a
Running Hot 🔥
Gainers
Rail Vision Unit [RVSN] >> +71.9%
MGO Global [MGOL] >> +16.7%
MorphoSys ADR [MOR] >> +16.8%
Decliners
Allakos [ALLK] >> (56.1%)
SRIVARU [SVMH] >> (23.0%)
Ault Alliance [AUL] >> (30.9%)
HomeStreet [HMST] - Last Close: $10.77
A newly announced merger deal with FirstSun Capital Bancorp [FSUN] is rallying this micro-cap bank stock.
Under the terms of the deal, HomeStreet will merge into FirstSun while continuing to operate under its trade name in its current markets.
HMST shareholders will get 0.4345 shares of FirstSun common stock for each common share, an equivalent cash value of $14.75 per share.
The combined entity is expected to be listed on NASDAQ at closing. The deal will also include a $175 million equity raise for the combined company.
Both boards have approved the deal, and it’s expected to close in mid-2024. Shares of HMST are up 31.6% on nearly 300K shares traded.
My Take: HMST is already trading very close to its buyout price, so it doesn’t look like there’s a lot of upside potential left for this move.
CBL Intl. [BANL] - Last Close: $1.35
An early morning press release announcing a crucial business update is boosting shares of the Malaysian shipping company.
CBL said its subsidiary, Banle Energy Intl., has arranged bunkering services to support the inaugural journey of BYD’s first car carrier at a port in China.
After receiving the bunkering services at Yan Tai port, the BYD car carrier will stop by Shenzhen for loading automobiles before exporting to Europe.
Financial details of the arrangement weren’t initially disclosed, but BANL is up 19.2% on more than 2 million shares traded on the news.
My Take: BYD overtook Tesla in global EV sales in the final quarter of 2023, and this deal could mark the beginning of a more involved business relationship between the up-and-coming EV maker and BANL.
SEALSQ [LAES] - Last Close: $2.26
This tiny semiconductor developer just announced the launch of SEALCOIN.AI with Google Cloud as its technology provider.
SEALCOIN is a digital token and an advanced cryptocurrency designed to “establish a robust economy” for billions of “internet-driven devices.”
The company also said it has an install base of over 1.6 billion semiconductors that will gradually benefit from the SEALCOIN.
LAES is a top mover with a 14.1% gain on the news, and roughly 6 million shares have changed hands in the premarket so far.
My Take: The SEC’s recent approve of Bitcoin ETFs seems to have given crypto stocks a boost as of late. The sentiment boost could explain the sudden rally in LAES today.
Phunware [PHUN] - Last Close: $0.0759
Former president Donald Trump’s dominant performance at the Iowa caucus is rallying shares of this tiny software developer.
Back in 2020, Trump’s campaign hired Phunware to build a phone app, and it could get another deal if Trump wins the nomination again.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Trump won in Iowa by “the largest margin in the history of the first GOP presidential nominating contest.”
PHUN is this morning’s most active stock with nearly 80 million shares traded, and it’s up 64.5%.
My Take: The PHUN trade is pure speculation at this point, but that doesn’t appear to be slowing down today’s rally.
That's it for today! Thanks for reading, and good luck out there!
Best Regards,
— Chris D.
Elite Trade Club
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