Plus, the FDA asked Emergent BioSolutions to temporarily halt producing materials for COVID-19 vaccines, Coca-Cola reported an earnings beat, and cryptocurrencies had a bad weekend.
Stocks were lower at the open on Monday with the Dow dropping 18 points, or less than 0.1%. The S&P 500 slid by 0.1%, while the Nasdaq sank by 0.5%.
GameStop shares are up nearly 8% this morning after the retailer said CEO George Sherman will stop down on or before July 31. The board is leading a search to identify CEO candidates with the capabilities and experience to help “accelerate the next phase of the company’s transformation” into an e-commerce powerhouse, GameStop said in a statement. “GameStop’s next CEO and CFO are likely to come from the tech industry, as with the other recent senior hires, and would require a wide range of strategic and operational experience, given GameStop’s complex business model, including ~4,800 global stores, digital, used games, new software and hardware, and collectibles,” said Telsey Advisory Group analyst Joseph Feldman.
Emergent BioSolutions shares are down 9% at the time of writing after the FDA asked the company to temporarily stop producing materials for COVID-19 vaccines while U.S. regulators investigate its plant in Baltimore that’s responsible for ruining millions of Johnson & Johnson shots. Speaking of the JNJ vaccine, Dr. Anthony Fauci said to NBC’s “Meet the Press” this weekend that he expects the beleaguered vaccine to again become available for use in the U.S. sooner than later. Fauci said it would be surprising “if we don’t have a resumption in some form by Friday,” adding that it would be possible to bring the shot back “but to do it with some form of restriction or some form of warning.”
In earnings news, Coca-Cola delivered an earnings beat and said that demand in March rose to pre-pandemic levels. The company reported adjusted earnings per share of $0.55 on revenue of $9.02 billion, versus estimates for earnings of $0.50 per share on revenue of $8.6 billion. “We remain focused on emerging stronger and executing against our growth accelerators during the recovery phase. We are pleased with the progress we are making,”said CEO James Quincey in a statement. “We are encouraged by improvements in our business, especially in markets where vaccine availability is increasing and economies are opening up, and we remain confident in our full year guidance.”
Nvidia shares are down more than 3% today after the U.K. government issued a Public Interest Intervention Notice (PIIN) against the chip maker’s $40 billion takeover of chip designer Arm on national security grounds. “Following careful consideration of the proposed takeover of Arm, I have today issued an intervention notice on national security grounds,” said Oliver Dowden, Britain’s Digital Secretary. “As a next step and to help me gather the relevant information, the U.K.’s independent competition authority will now prepare a report on the implications of the transaction, which will help inform any further decisions. We want to support our thriving U.K. tech industry and welcome foreign investment, but it is appropriate that we properly consider the national security implications of a transaction like this.” A Nvidia spokesperson said in response, “We do not believe that this transaction poses any material national security issues. We will continue to work closely with the British authorities, as we have done since the announcement of this deal.”
And cryptocurrencies are on the rebound after a difficult weekend. Bitcoin, the world’s largest digital coin, has recovered to $54,931 after falling as low as $52,149 on Sunday following its rise to an all-time high of $64,829 last week. Ether, the second largest cryptocurrency, fell below $2,000 over the weekend and has recovered to $2,100 this morning. “The crypto world is waking up with a bit of a sore head today,” said Antoni Trenchev, co-founder of crypto lender Nexo. “Dogecoin’s 100% Friday rally was ‘peak party’ after the bitcoin record and Coinbase listing earlier in the week. Euphoria was in the air. And usually in the crypto world, there’s a price to pay when that happens.”
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McGrath RentCorp (NASDAQ: MGRC): McGrath RentCorp recently announced it has acquired Kitchens To Go, a leader in both interim and permanent modular solutions for foodservice providers that require flexible facilities to continue of expand operations. “Our acquisition of Kitchens To Go is highly complementary to our modular building rental business,” said Joe Hanna President and CEO of McGrath RentCorp. “As we expand our ability to provide solutions to our customers, there are opportunities for us to serve businesses that have a temporary facilities need with their food service projects. I am pleased to welcome the team at Kitchens To Go as they have deep knowledge of the industry and a wonderful culture that will fit well with us. We now have another product line that is a logical adjacency to our core business and we look forward to growing it together.”