Stocks stay hot in Tuesday's premarket 🔥

Good Morning! 

It's Chris from Elite Trade Club, here to give you this morning's premarket trading news.

We’re back to our regularly scheduled programming today. The Closing Bell Roundup will be out at its usual time.

Now, let's get ready to trade!

Markets 📈

U.S. large-caps continued to perform well on Monday, but the small-cap Russell 2K took a small loss.

S&P 500 futures are currently up by just shy of 0.2%, so we could be heading for a higher open.

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Premarket Highlights 🔎

💹 Yen Dips as Bank of Japan Holds Steady on Rates

The Bank of Japan (BOJ) has chosen to stay the course in its latest meeting, keeping short-term interest rates at minus 0.1%. This decision, along with the absence of hints on near-term policy changes, led to a significant weakening of the yen.

📉 Yen's Reaction: 
Following the BOJ's announcement, the yen experienced a sharp drop, weakening by over 1% and trading as weak as 144.68 against the dollar.

📈 Market Responses:
Japanese Government Bonds saw a rally post-announcement, and Japan's benchmark stock index, the Nikkei 225, climbed by 1.4% on the news.

🔍 Looking Ahead:

• No Clues from Ueda: While many analysts anticipate an end to negative interest rates by the BOJ in the first half of next year, Governor Kazuo Ueda did not offer any specific insights. He expressed the need for more evidence of a positive cycle of rising wages and prices in Japan.

• Communication Caution: Ueda emphasized the challenge of communicating rate increases or giving a short-term rate outlook, as it could potentially lead to market confusion.

• Fed's Influence: Acknowledging that potential Federal Reserve rate cuts could impact foreign-exchange rates, Ueda stated it would be inappropriate for the BOJ to hasten policy changes simply to preempt the Fed.

In summary, the Bank of Japan's decision to maintain its negative interest rate policy has immediate effects on the yen and the bond market, while leaving investors speculating about the future direction of Japanese monetary policy.

What to Watch Today 👀

Will the Hot Streak Continue?
The market has performed very well since Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell told investors the central bank has penciled in three rate cuts for 2024, but how long can the market keep up this momentum? It could be the perfect set up for a late-year “Santa Clause” rally, but remember that trading volume can get thin around the holidays. Significant pullbacks aren’t uncommon around the Christmas holiday, but investor sentiment seems to be running fairly high.

Featured Earnings 💲

• Accenture [ACN] ... AM

• FactSet [FDS] ... AM

• FedEx [FDX] ... PM

• Worthington Enterprises [WOR] ... PM

• Enerpac Tool Group [EPAC] ... PM

• Steelcase [SCS] ... PM

Economy 🏗

• Housing starts [Nov] ... 8:30a

• Building permits [Nov] ... 8:30a

Gainers

• Yoshiharu Global [YOSH] >> +22.0%

• Jin Medical Intl. [ZJYL] >> +23.7%

• Movano [MOVE] >> +24.8%

Decliners

• Micromobility [MCOM] >> (46.7%)

• Motus GI [MOTS] >> (44.1%)

• ETAO Intl. [ETAO] >> (40.5%)

Panbela Therapeutics [PBLA] - Last Close: $1.01

This tiny biotech is running hot after announcing a new FDA drug approval that will trigger a developmental milestone payment to the company.

US WorldMeds received FDA approval for the use of eflornithine as a maintenance therapy for high-risk neuroblastoma patients.

Eflornithine was developed by Panbela, but ,in July 2023, it was divested to USWM in a deal that included $9.5 million in potential milestone payments.

The drug’s approval bodes well for the triggering of the developmental, commercial, and clinical milestones.

PBLA is up 68.3% on 15.2 million shares traded in response to the news.

InfoBird [IFBD] - Last Close: $1.35

The China-based SaaS company has landed a new business cooperation to speed the development of new IT systems.

In a late Monday press release, InfoBird said the contract is worth roughly US$1.8 million.

InforBird didn’t reveal the name of the contracted party, but the press release said its principal business is a Gig Economy Platform.

Shares of IFBD are up 48.3% on 5.2 million shares traded.

Compugen [CGEN] - Last Close: $0.73

An upcoming AstraZenece [AZN] clinical trial is expected to trigger a $10 million milestone payment for Compugen upon dosing of the first patient.

AstraZeneca’s rilvegostomig drug was developed using Compugen’s TIGIT component, and an upcoming Phase 3 trial in biliary tract cancer patients will officially trigger the payments.

The milestone payments were put in place as part of a 2018 licensing deal between the companies.

Compugen also announced an exclusive license deal with Gilead Sciences [GILD] for its COM503 preclinical IL-18 biology program.

CGEN is up 172.6% on all the good news, with 17.2 million shares traded.

LogicMark [LGMK] - Last Close: $0.9191

On Monday, Analysts from Refinitiv/Verus upgraded this tiny healthcare tech stock to “hold” from “sell.”

Specific details of the note couldn’t be accessed at the time of writing, but the upgrade seems to be giving the stock a boost today.

LGMK is up 45.8% on more than 3.7 million shares traded in the premarket.

That's it for today! Thanks for reading, and good luck out there!

Best Regards,

— Chris D.
Elite Trade Club

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