Mid-afternoon market update: Dow gains 150 points, Red Cat Holdings shares spike higher

Toward the end of trading Monday, the Dow traded up 0.43% to 34,949.08 while the NASDAQ fell 0.35% to 14,995.27. The S&P also fell, dropping 0.05% to 4,453.40.

The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 42,932,210 cases with around 688,040 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 33,678,780 cases and 447,190 deaths, while Brazil reported over 21,351,970 COVID-19 cases with 594,440 deaths. In total, there were at least 231,898,110 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 4,749,570 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Energy shares jumped 3.3% on Monday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Camber Energy, Inc. CEI +32.84% (Get Free Alerts for CEI), up 22% and Southwestern Energy Company SWN +21.89% (Get Free Alerts for SWN) up 18%.

In trading on Monday, health care shares fell 1.4%.

Top Headline

US durable goods orders rose 1.8% in August following a revised 0.5% growth in July. Analysts, meanwhile were expecting for a 0.7% increase.

Equities Trading UP

Red Cat Holdings, Inc. RCAT +50% shares shot up 52% to $3.6480 after the company said its subsidiary, Skypersonic, Inc, won a five-year contract from NASA to provide drone and rover software, hardware, and support for the Simulated Mars mission.

Shares of Cellect Biotechnology Ltd. APOP +12.71% got a boost, shooting 18% to $22.38 after the company announced shareholder approval of the strategic merger with Quoin Pharmaceuticals.

Seelos Therapeutics, Inc. SEEL +14.35% shares were also up, gaining 16% to $2.43. Roth Capital upgraded Seelos Therapeutics from Neutral to Buy and raised the price target from $2.5 to $8.

Equities Trading DOWN

ASLAN Pharmaceuticals Limited ASLN +34.77% shares tumbled 35% to $2.11 after the company announced topline data from its Phase 1 study of ASLAN004 for moderate-to-severe atopic dermatitis (AD).

Shares of MEDIROM Healthcare Technologies Inc. MRM +7.67% were down 11% to $10.10 after dropping 11% on Friday. MEDIROM Healthcare Technologies recently said it will buy ZACC Kabushiki Kaisha for $3.362 million.

ReWalk Robotics Ltd. RWLK +12.44% was down, falling 14% to $1.7250 as the company reported a 16 million share offering at $2.035 per share.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 1.9% to $75.40, while gold traded up 0.1% to $1,752.10.

Silver traded up 1.2% Monday to $22.69 while copper fell 0.1% to $4.2815.

Euro zone

European shares closed mostly higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 slipped 0.19%, the Spanish Ibex Index rose 1.46% and the German DAX 30 gained 0.27%. Meanwhile, the London’s FTSE 100 rose 0.17%, French CAC 40 rose 0.19% and Italy’s FTSE MIB gained 0.63%.

Loans to households in the Eurozone increased 4.2% in August, unchanged from the earlier month's growth. Producer prices in Spain surged 18% year-over-year in August following a 15.6% increase in the prior month.

Economics

US durable goods orders rose 1.8% in August following a revised 0.5% growth in July. Analysts, meanwhile were expecting for a 0.7% increase.