Gapping up
In reaction to strong earnings/guidance:
- CDMO +15.5%, CASY +4.4%, SONC +1.1%
M&A news:
- IDTI +11.4% (Integrated Device to be acquired by Renesas (RNECF) for $49.00/share in cash, or approximately $6.7 bln)
- XL +1% (after AXA [AXAHY] obtained regulatory approvals for the acquisition of XL Group that is now expected to close on September 12)
Select names showing strength related to impact of hurricane:
- BECN +2.1%, GNRC +1.8%, HD +0.9%, LOW +0.9%, TSCO +0.6%, BGG +0.6%
Other news:
- SIGA +13.5% (awarded BARDA contract for TPOXX valued at up to $629 mln)
- ACRX +6.2% (announces date of FDA advisory committee meeting for Dsuvia)
- SSTI +5.5% (after making new all-time highs and closing up 4% on the day)
- NTNX +3.2% (closed the largest deal in company history in Q4 of fiscal 2018, worth more than $20m with an agency in the U.S. Department of Defense)
- SB +2.8% (Safe Bulkers agrees with Cosco Shipping Heavy Industry Co. Ltd. to install Alfa Laval PureSOx Scrubbers)
- HTHT +2.4% (reiterates corporate policy and commitment of ensuring the safety and privacy of customer information)
- TRVN +2.3% (FDA scheduled Oct 11 meeting of the Anesthetic and Analgesic Drug Products Advisory Committee to discuss safety/efficacy of oliceridine injection for the management of acute pain)
- CRSP +1% (CRISPR Therapeutics, Intellia (NTLA) and Caribou Biosciences provide update on appeal upholding the PTO ruling in interference proceeding relating to CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing technology ), .
Analyst comments:
- RUN +3.8% (upgraded to Buy from Neutral at BofA/Merrill)
- SNAP +2.3% (upgraded to Outperform from Neutral at Wedbush)
- EQNR +1.9% (upgraded to Equal Weight from Underweight at Barclays)
- BBDC +1.5% (upgraded to Outperform from Mkt Perform at Raymond James)
- DRI +1.2% (upgraded to Buy from Neutral at Goldman)
- CZR +1% (initiated with a Outperform at Credit Suisse)
- NKE +0.9% (upgraded to Buy from Hold at Canaccord Genuity)
- ENDP +0.8% (upgraded to Neutral from Sell at Goldman)
Early premarket gappersGapping up:
- CDMO +18.1%, SIGA +16.3%, IDTI +11.2%, SSTI +5.5%, BGG +5%, CASY +4.4%, NTNX +3.8%, SB +2.8%, HTHT +2.4%, TRVN +2.3%, BSX +2%, AMD +1.5%, DOCU +1.2%, GNRC +1.2%, CRSP +1%, XL +0.9%, HD +0.9%, BECN +0.9%, TSCO +0.6%, ZEN +0.5%, LOW +0.5%
Gapping down:
- LMNR -16.5%, SONO -13.6%, MTRX -11.5%, PACB -8.9%, NNBR -7.1%, ECYT -3.9%, TSLA -2.6%, PSX -2.5%, SD -2.1%, PODD -1%, OSTK -0.8%, BA -0.7%, DAL -0.6%, CBS -0.5%
United States issues fresh warning to airlines about using Iranian airspace - https://reut.rs/2N7VAbK
(Reuters) - The United States has issued a fresh warning to airlines to exercise caution when operating in Iran’s airspace, citing concerns over military activity including an unnamed U.S. civil operator being intercepted by fighter jets in December 2017.
The updated guidance from the Federal Aviation Administration to U.S. operators, issued on Sunday at the expiry of the prior year’s advisory, said there were also military activities emanating from or transiting through Iran’s airspace associated with the conflict in Syria.
Tensions ramped up between Iran and the United States after President Donald Trump pulled out of a landmark nuclear deal with Iran in May and reimposed sanctions on the Islamic Republic last month.
Flight Service Bureau, which provides safety information on airspace to airlines, said “without seeming alarmist”, the deteriorating relationship between the U.S. and Iran must be taken into account when planning flights in Iran’s airspace.
“Although the reopening of Iraqi airspace in November last year has provided additional routing options ... there is no perfect route in the region, and operators must consider their preference for Iraq vs Iran,” the U.S. based group said in an email to clients on Monday.
The U.S. Department of State advises that its citizens do not travel to Iran due to the risk of arbitrary arrest and detention. Flight Service Bureau said that could present problems in the event of an unplanned landing in Iran for medical or technical reasons.
For Iraq, the U.S. Department of State advises its citizens against travel to the country due to terrorism and armed conflict. The F.A.A.’s latest guidance on Iraq, issued in December 2017, prohibits U.S. airlines in most cases from flying at an altitude lower than 26,000 feet due to the potential for fighting.
*HONG KONG'S HANG SENG INDEX FALLS INTO BEAR MARKET
Is Indonesia the Next Emerging-Market Domino to Fall?
Indonesia looks healthier than the likes of Argentina and Turkey, but investors are right to be concerned
Investors who gorged themselves on Turkish delight and Argentine beef have had a rude awakening in 2018—the two countries are at the heart of a broadening crisis that has sent emerging-market currencies tumbling.
In Asia, one name keeps coming up: Indonesia, which also has a growing trade deficit—and lots of foreign debt. On paper, Indonesia has done everything right to reassure markets this summer, from raising interest rates to cutting spending and lifting import taxes.
Investors still aren’t convinced. The Indonesian rupiah has dropped 10% against the dollar this year, back to levels last seen during the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s. Some of this can be attributed to contagion. But there are concrete reasons to refrain from bottom-fishing, even with benchmark Indonesian government bond yields looking attractive at about 8%.
On the surface, Indonesia looks healthier than the likes of Argentina. Public debt, at 29% of GDP at the end of last year, was well below normal levels in many developed countries. And Indonesia is still earning plenty of cash from exports to help pay off its foreign creditors. Short-term foreign debt was equivalent to 27% of the value of its exports in the year ended July, according to Nomura, compared with 141% for Argentina and 76% for Turkey.
The headline numbers don’t tell the full story. Indonesia, like China, relies heavily on state-owned enterprises for investment—and they aren’t in great financial shape. Its top state-owned infrastructure companies had aggregate earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization equivalent to less than four times their interest expense by late 2017, according to Trinh Nguyen and Gary Ng, economists at Natixis , against a global median of eight times for the sector. The country’s low direct government debt looks less convincing in that context.
Indonesia also looks vulnerable because it is both a big coal exporter and a net oil importer. The former makes it susceptible to a China slowdown—prices for low-caloric value Indonesian coal have tumbled since June, while oil prices have remained high. The country’s monthly trade deficit in July was its largest since 2013, largely due to expensive energy imports.
Indonesia is no Turkey or Argentina, but investors are right to be concerned. Juicy bond yields notwithstanding, spelunking in Indonesia’s coal mines while broader emerging markets are filling up with water looks a risky business.
Copyright Battle in Europe Pits Media Companies Against Tech Giants
Publishers, music companies support the law because they would get the right to negotiate payment for “digital use” from Facebook, Google
BRUSSELS—A new European push to rein in tech giants through copyright legislation is sparking fierce debate and questions about whether the proposed law would accomplish its goals.
The fight pits big publishers, music companies and movie directors against internet giants including Facebook Inc. FB 0.70% and Alphabet Inc.’s GOOGL -0.21% Google, as well as open-internet advocates and some small publishers.
It is coming to a head because the European Parliament plans to vote Wednesday on a draft copyright directive that supporters say would bolster media producers against internet platforms and hold those platforms more responsible for paying for content, such as copyrighted music playing in the background of an uploaded home video.
The vote, which also will include more than 200 proposed amendments, will set parameters for potentially protracted negotiations among the parliament, the EU’s executive body and European governments. If a law is ultimately agreed, EU countries would have up to two years to implement the new rules, which would be enforced by member countries.
The proposal comes atop recently enacted EU web-privacy legislation, known as GDPR, a $5 billion fine levied on Google’s Android mobile operating system, and EU rules requiring search engines to remove material as requested by individuals in certain cases.
Critics of the draft, including both technology giants and individuals who want to maintain easy sharing on the web, contend the law would have many negative consequences, including stifling free expression, hampering innovation and forcing new expenses on small startups required to filter content for copyright material.
Fighting over the law has been unusually fierce, say veterans of EU legislative battles. Celebrities including Paul McCartney and Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales have lobbied for and against the law, respectively. EU legislators say they’ve received hundreds of emails against the draft text on some days.
Media companies, particularly publishers, say their business has been gutted by Facebook and Google through their sharing of published materials that provide little or no revenue or user data back to the publishers. The platforms’ behavior amounts to theft, said Mathias Döpfner, chief executive of German publisher Axel Springer SE. The new law would give news publishers the right to negotiate payment for “digital use” of their content by tech firms.
“If somebody else can just steal what you have created,” Mr. Döpfner told a conference organized by German rival Hubert Burda Media in Brussels, “then this is just a hopeless case for content creators.”
Burda CEO Paul-Bernhard Kallen said the principle “is a matter of justice.”
News Corp , NWSA -0.32% publisher of The Wall Street Journal, supports the law’s copyright protection.
A Google spokesman declined to comment on the draft law. When it was first proposed in 2016, Google’s head of public policy said in a blog that the draft contained “worrying elements” that could mean “everything uploaded to the web must be cleared by lawyers before it can find an audience.”
A spokeswoman for Facebook said that its platform offers tools for rights holders to protect their content, adding “We hope that the debate going forward will focus on the original mission of protecting copyright and ensuring a vibrant marketplace for content creation.”
Opponents also include Julia Reda, a member of the European Parliament from the Pirate Party, which advocates open access and personal privacy on the internet. She has called the copyright law a “link tax,” warning the law could force internet users to pay for content accessed through hyperlinks that they now get for free. In July she helped derail the law from fast-track approval because it “would have massively restricted our freedom of expression,” a statement on her website says.
Hyperlinks have been explicitly excluded from the law, say advocates, meaning there would be no “link tax.”
The fight is raging even though some backers acknowledge the law, if enacted, would face tough odds in changing how news is presented on the internet. Similar laws in Germany and Spain had little impact and in Spain prompted Google to stop its Google News service. Still, backers say, a law covering the EU’s 28 countries would force platforms to change their behavior.
“Having something at the European level creates a new dynamic,” said Angela Mills Wade, executive director of the European Publishers Council, a trade group.
Print publishers say the law would give them rights similar to those held by copyright owners of music and video material. “Legal recognition gives us better legal standing against the platforms in negotiations on usage” of published material, said Miruna Herovanu, an adviser at News Media Europe, a trade group.
Some small publishers, individuals and academics who want broad distribution more than revenue fear the law would restrict publication of their materials.
Mathias Vermeulen, a spokesman for Dutch EU lawmaker Marietje Schaake, who is critical of the law, said she received about 3,000 emails before a vote on the law earlier in the summer. He said publishers ignored concerns of more than 200 academics about the law.
“In the end this was a very sad debate to watch,” Mr. Vermeulen said.