Here are the top stories to read ahead of [insert day of the week] trading:
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One of the more interesting moves in the premarket came in the solar sector, where the likes of SunRun, First Solar and Enphase Energy saw gains of around 4% to 5% each. That follows Tuesday’s night debate in which Vice President Kamala Harris was perceived to have outperformed former President Donald Trump.
The solar sector has struggled this year, with the Invesco Solar ETF losing 29%, reaching a new 52-week low on Tuesday.
It’s not obvious that Trump would be worse for the solar sector. There would be the possibility that in a Republican sweep scenario, the clean energy investment brought in under the Inflation Reduction Act could be at risk.
At the same time, note analysts at RBC Capital Markets, 88% of clean energy investment is in Republican districts. Moreover, the tariffs Trump has proposed could be supportive of prices.
Stocks making notable moves in Wednesday’s premarket action:
Trump Media & Technology shares are tumbling more than 16% as investors sell in the belief that Tuesday’s presidential debate makes it less likely Donald Trump will win the White House.
Former President Trump is, after a recent about-face, considered a supporter of bitcoin, and so shares of bitcoin investor MicroStrategy and crypto trading platform Coinbase Global are down 3.5% and 2.5% respectively.
GameStop shares are retreating more than 9% after the videogame retailer surprised investors with a quarterly profit, but sales dropped more than 30% and it disclosed a 20 million share stock offering.
Dave & Buster Entertainment shares are surging nearly 13% after the arcade-restaurant operator posted higher profit and revenue in its fiscal second quarter.
U.S.-listed shares of Rentokil are tumbling 17% after the U.K. pest control group – in which Nelson Peltz’s activist fund Trian Partners confirmed in June it held a “significant position”- warned of a $105 million hit to its U.S. arm.
How are stock-index futures trading:
S&P 500 futures are down 0.4%.
Dow Jones Industrial Average futures are off 0.4%.
Nasdaq 100 futures are slipping 0.5%.
On Tuesday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 93 points, or 0.23%, to 40,737, the S&P 500 increased 24 points, or 0.45%, to 5,496, and the Nasdaq Composite gained 141 points, or 0.84%, to 17,026.
Equity index futures are a touch softer as caution reigns ahead of the U.S. consumer price inflation report for August, due at 8:30 a.m.
Economists expect the headline annual CPI will have risen 2.6%, slower than July’s reading of 2.9%. The move closer to the Federal Reserve’s 2% target should allow the central bank to start cutting interest rates next week.
Meanwhile, U.S. assets, including the dollar and stock-index futures, have pared some of their earlier losses which came after Kamala Harris was deemed the winner in Tuesday night’s presidential debate with Donald Trump.
“A tense U.S. presidential election debate…only had a limited impact on the markets. While polls suggest people’s voting intentions swung more towards Harris as a result of the debate, the election is still going to be a close call,” says Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell.
“Cryptocurrency was the main focal point for market movements. Trump is seen as being pro-cryptocurrency and a weaker position in the polls following the debate might explain why the price of bitcoin retreated by 2%,” he adds.
Companies presenting earnings on Wednesday include Manchester United before the opening bell and Oxford Industries after the close.
The Treasury will announce the result of a $39 billion auction of 10-year notes at 1:00 p.m.
