US Stocks Kick Off The Week In The Green, Tesla Rockets On China's FSD Approval, Yen Rallies: What's Driving Markets Monday?

Author: Piero Cingari | April 29, 2024 02:14pm

U.S. stocks kicked off the week on a positive note, with all major averages edging higher in anticipation of significant events including earnings reports from tech giants like Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) on Tuesday and Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) on Thursday, a pivotal Federal Reserve Open Market Committee meeting on Wednesday, and the April’s jobs report on Friday.

The S&P 500 rose 0.2% by midday trading in New York, following a 1% surge last Friday. Both the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 and blue-chip stocks in the Dow Jones made similar gains.

Small caps, as tracked by iShares Russell 2000 ETF (NYSE:IWM), outperformed large-cap stocks, rising as much as 0.9%.

Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA) grabbed the market spotlight by securing a significant partnership with Chinese search engine giant Baidu Inc. (NYSE:BIDU), which granted the Elon Musk-led company access to its mapping license for data collection on China’s public roads.

The deal removes a last regulatory barrier for Tesla’s driver assistance system, known as Full Self-Driving (FSD), to be introduced in China. Shares of Tesla rose as much as 16% Monday.

The Bank of Japan sent shockwaves through the forex exchange market by intervening to support the value of the Japanese yen, which had plummeted to as low as 160 per dollar overnight. This action spurred a significant reversal in the USD/JPY exchange rate, plunging to as low as 155 by 1 p.m. ET.

In the commodities market, natural gas prices jumped by nearly 7% on improved demand forecasts, with the U.S. Henry Hub futures surpassing $2 per million British thermal units.

Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) was 0.5% lower, on track to notch a six-day losing streak.

Monday’s Performance In Major U.S. Indices, ETFs

Major Indices & ETFs	Price	1-day %chg
Russell 2000	2,020.94	0.8%
Dow Jones	38,357.10	0.3%
Nasdaq 100	17,770.47	0.3%
S&P 500	5,112.21	0.2%

The SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (NYSE:SPY) rose 0.3% to $509.73, the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average (NYSE:DIA) rose 0.3% to $383.49 and the tech-heavy Invesco QQQ Trust (NASDAQ:QQQ) inched 0.2% up to $432.31, according to Benzinga Pro data. 

Sector-wise, the Consumer Discretionary Select Sector SPDR Fund (NYSE:XLY) outperformed, up 2.3%, followed by the Utilities Select Sector SPDR Fund (NYSE:XLU), up 1.5%. The Communication Services Select Sector SPDR Fund (NYSE:XLC) was the major laggard, down 1%.

Monday’s Stock Movers

• Lithium miners rallied on strong EV momentum, with Arcadium Lithium plc (NYSE:ALTM), Piedmont Lithium Inc. (OTC:PLLTL) and Albemarle Corporation (NYSE:ALB) up 16%, 10% and 7%, respectively.
• AMC International Holdings Inc. (NYSE:AMC) fell 10.8% on weaker first-quarter preliminary results.
• SoFi Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ:SOFI) fell 10% as second-quarter revenue guidance missed Street’s forecasts.
• Other stocks reacting to earnings were ON Semiconductor Corp. (NASDAQ:ON) up 3.3%, Dominos Pizza Inc. (NYSE:DPZ) up 6%, Revvity Inc. (NYSE:RVTY) up 3.8%, Franklin Resources Inc. (NYSE:BEN) down over 6%,
• Deciphera Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:DCPH) saw its shares soar by 73% to $25.36 following the announcement of its acquisition by ONO Pharmaceutical for $25.60 per share in cash.
• Soleno Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:SLNO) witnessed a 31.1% surge in its shares to $49.66 after the company revealed it had been granted Breakthrough Therapy Designation from the FDA for DCCR extended-release tablets in the treatment of Prader-Willi Syndrome.
• Notable names reporting after the close are F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV), Everest Group, Ltd. (NYSE:EG), NXP Semiconductors N.V. (NASDAQ:NXPI), Lattice Semiconductor Corp. (NASDAQ:LSCC), MicroStrategy Inc (NASDAQ:MSTR), Paramount Global (NASDAQ:PARA)(NASDAQ:PARAA), Qiagen NV (NYSE:QGEN), Rambus Inc. (NASDAQ:RMBS), Sanmina Corp (NASDAQ:SANM) and Yum China Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:YUMC).

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