Nasdaq Down Over 2%; Walgreens Posts Upbeat Results – Conduit Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:CDT), DatChat (NASDAQ:DATS)

U.S. stocks traded lower midway through trading, with the Nasdaq Composite falling over 400 points on Friday.

The Dow traded down 1.64% to 41,935.30 while the NASDAQ dipped 2.15% to 19,060.79. The S&P 500 also fell, dropping, 1.77% to 5,813.73.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

Energy shares rose by 0.6% on Friday.

In trading on Friday, information technology shares tumbled by 2.1%.

Top Headline

On Friday, Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc WBA reported better-than-expected first-quarter results.

The company posted quarterly sales of $39.46 billion, up 7.5% year over year (+6.9% on constant currency), beating the consensus of $37.28 billion, reflecting sales growth across all segments.

Adjusted EPS was 51 cents, down from 66 cents a year ago, beating the consensus of 37 cents, according to data from Benzinga Pro.

Equities Trading UP
                       

• Conduit Pharmaceuticals Inc CDT shares shot up 52% to $0.12.
• Shares of Vision Marine Technologies Inc VMARgot a boost, surging 72% to $2.62 as it regained compliance with Nasdaq’s minimum stockholders’ equity requirement, which it previously failed to meet. Vision Marine partnered with Calip Group to produce advanced cooling plates for electric boat batteries.
• DatChat Inc DATS shares were also up, gaining 107% to $6.63 after the company announced the pricing of a $5.1 million registered direct offering priced at-the-market under Nasdaq rules.

Equities Trading DOWN

• IGM Biosciences Inc IGMS shares dropped 69% to $1.94  after the company announced it is halting further development of Imvotamab and IGM-2644.
• Shares of XTI Aerospace Inc XTIA were down 54% to $5.82. XTI Aerospace recently announced a $20 million offering of 363,636,364 shares at $0.055 per share.
• 22nd Century Group Inc XXII was down, falling 39% to $4.97.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 2.4% to $75.67 while gold traded up 1% at $2,716.70.

Silver traded up 1% to $31.315 on Friday, while copper fell 0.2% to $4.2995.

Euro zone

European shares were lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 declined 0.79%, Germany’s DAX 40 fell 0.44% and France’s CAC 40 dipped 0.85%. Spain’s IBEX 35 Index fell 1.43%, while London’s FTSE 100 slipped 0.83%.

Asia Pacific Markets

Asian markets closed lower on Friday, with Japan’s Nikkei 225 falling 1.05%, China’s Shanghai Composite Index dipping 1.33%, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index declining 0.92% and India’s BSE Sensex falling 0.31%.

Economics

• Nonfarm payrolls rose by 256,000 last month, up from the downwardly revised 212,000 in November and sharply surpassing economist expectations of 160,000 payrolls as tracked by TradingEconomics.
• The unemployment rate fell from 4.2% to 4.1%, beating forecasts of an unchanged reading.
• Average hourly earnings rose 0.3% month-over-month in December, matching expectations but slowing from November’s 0.4%. On a year-over-year basis, wages increased 3.9%, slightly below of the 4% forecast.

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