A look at the day's big movers
RISERS
Eaglet Corp (NASDAQ:EGLT), up 29% at US$1.30
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted tentative approval for an expanded label for ARYMO ER (morphine sulfate) extended-release tablets C-II for the management of pain severe enough to require daily, around-the-clock, long-term opioid treatment and for which alternative treatment options are inadequate.
Univar Inc (NYSE:UNVR), up 7% at US$30.82
The company announced pricing for its stock offering: US$28.79 a share.
FALLERS
Trovagene Inc (NASDAQ:TROV), down 40% at US$0.2562
The precision medicine biotechnology company is to issue 15mln stocks plus warrants at 30 cents a pop.
Ohr Pharmaceutical Inc (NASDAQ:OHRP), down 14% at US$1.47.
The company reported a loss of US$23.8mln in the year to the end of September, which was a slight improvement on the previous year's loss of US$25.8mln.
AFTER-HOURS MOVERS
The spotlight of activist hedge fund management Elliott Management has swung back round to Hess Corp (NYSE:Hess), the oil and gas producer.
The investment firm owns around 6.6% of Hess and has voiced its dissatisfaction with management before, back in 2013, which ultimately led to three members of Elliott joining the Hess board.
“As long-term shareholders in Hess, we are frustrated by the company’s continuing under performance,” declared John Pike, a senior portfolio manager at Elliott.
“Shareholders are getting impatient, because the changes needed to remedy Hess’s severe undervaluation are substantial and need to be announced without delay,” he added, lighting a fire under the Hess share price in after-hours trading.
The stock has finished the regular trading session 3.2% lower at US$42.67, but in screen-based trading recouped all of those losses and more, rising 4.6% to US$44.65.
Database software giant Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL) performed the opposite trick, rising (0.3%) in regular trading and then shedding 4.8% at US$47.80 after releasing a mixed set of results for the second quarter of its financial year.
“Although a license beat drove revenue out-performance, weak cloud results threw a wet blanket on the 2Q report and the guide, as PaaS/IaaS revenue continued to decelerate on declines in the legacy hosting business and continue delays in deploying Oracle Cloud machines,” noted broker Wedbush Securities.
“As we’ve been saying, meaningful acceleration in PaaS/IaaS will probably take several quarters, as ORCL works to gain traction with revamped packaging, pricing, and technology (autonomous database). We’re a little concerned that management’s commentary could create unrealistic expectations among investors about the pace of adoption of autonomous database, as customers generally take many quarters (or even years) to evaluate major new ORCL database technology innovations, even when value-add is significant,” the broker added.
“However, we’re optimistic that database ELA activity will remain solid, as ORCL benefits from a robust demand environment, a strong competitive position, and greater clarity on their pathway to cloud with their Oracle licenses,” the broker said, as it reiterated its 'outperform' rating.
Cancer drug developer Veristem Inc (NASDAQ:VSTM) fell 2.2% to US$3.57 after announcing plans to raise US$25mln through a stock offering.
Software house Adobe Systems Incorporated (NASDAQ:ADBE) edged higher on an earnings beat.
Earnings per share for the final quarter of the company's financial year clocked in 10 cents above the consensus forecast at US$1.26, and were up 36 cents year-on-year.
Another stock benefiting from beating market expectations with its earnings was Costco Wholesale Corporation (NASDAQ:COST).
The retailer/wholesaler's shares rose 2.7% to US$191.60 after posting a 17% year-on-year increase in profit in its fiscal first quarter.
Net income of US$640mln was equivalent to US$1.45 a share, up from US$1.24 the year before and ahead of the consensus forecast of US$1.35.