Mid-afternoon market update: Dow jumps over 600 points; Kroger shares spike higher

Toward the end of trading Thursday, the Dow traded up 1.84% to 34,649.26 while the NASDAQ rose 0.61% to 15,347.69. The S&P also rose, gaining 1.48% to 4,580.03.

The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 49,573,120 cases with around 805,000 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 34,606,540 cases and 469,720 deaths, while Brazil reported over 22,105,870 COVID-19 cases with 615,020 deaths. In total, there were at least 263,915,360 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 5,245,540 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Real estate shares climbed 3.1% on Thursday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Braemar Hotels & Resorts, Inc. BHR +8.93% (Get Free Alerts for BHR), up 7% and Franklin Street Properties Corp. FSP +6.7% (Get Free Alerts for FSP) up 7%.

In trading on Thursday, health care shares rose by just 0.5%.

Top Headline

Dollar General Corporation DG -3.06% reported better-than-expected earnings for its third quarter on Thursday.

Dollar General reported quarterly earnings of $2.08 per share, beating analysts’ estimates of $2.01 per share. The company’s quarterly sales came in at $8.50 billion, versus expectations of $8.49 billion.

Dollar General said it sees FY21 earnings of $9.90 to $10.20 per share.

Equities Trading UP

Duluth Holdings Inc. DLTH +17.73% shares shot up 18% to $16.03 after the company posted Q3 results and raised FY21 EPS guidance.

Shares of Biofrontera Inc. BFRI +22.18% got a boost, shooting 32% to $5.73. Biofrontera announced Notice of Allowance for U.S. patent titled 'Illumination for Photodynamic Therapy.'

The Kroger Co. KR +11.64% shares were also up, gaining 12% to $45.15 after the company reported upbeat Q3 results and raised FY21 adjusted EPS guidance.

Equities Trading DOWN

Kirkland's, Inc. KIRK -27.75% shares tumbled 27% to $15.04 after the company reported worse-than-expected Q3 results.

Shares of Context Therapeutics Inc. CNTX -23.39% were down 25% to $5.34 after the company announced a private placement of $31.25 million. The placement includes 5 million shares together with warrants to purchase 5 million shares.

Tantech Holdings Ltd TANH -57.45% was down, falling 58% to $0.6226 after the company priced 21,120,509 share common stock offering at $0.65 per share.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 0.4% to $65.80, while gold traded down 1.1% to $1,764.10.

Silver traded down 0.1% Thursday to $22.335 while copper rose 1% to $4.2910.

Euro zone

European shares closed lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 fell 1.15%, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 1.80% and the German DAX 30 dropped 1.35%. Meanwhile, the London’s FTSE 100 fell 0.55%, French CAC 40 dipped 1.25% and Italy’s FTSE MIB dipped 1.39%.

The Eurozone unemployment rate fell to 7.3% in October, while producer prices rose 5.4% from a month ago in October. The unemployment rate in Italy rose to 9.4% in October from 9.2% in the earlier month, while number of people registered as unemployed in Spain fell by 74,381 to 3.183 million in November.

Economics

Job cuts announced by companies dropped 34.8% from a month earlier to 14,875 in November.

US initial jobless claims increased to 222,000 in the week ending November 27th, versus 194,000 in the prior period.

US natural-gas supplies dropped 59 billion cubic feet last week, the Energy Information Administration said.