Wall Street shares are seen opening higher on Wednesday and several stocks are in play ahead of the bell.
IBM (NYSE:IBM), International Business Machines Corp is up 0.54% to US$154.25 as it was upgraded to 'outperform' from 'sector perform' at broker RBC Capital.
It also has hiked its price target on the stock to US$180 from US$160 a share.
Alibaba (NASDAQ:BABA) saw shares add 0.19% to US$184 each after hours as it emerged that the group's Ant Financial Services affiliate has ended its agreement to buy payment services company MoneyGram, following objections by federal regulators.
US blocks sale of money transfer service MoneyGram to Alibaba's Ant Financial; Ant Financial will pay a $30M termination fee for the deal breakup (Anita Balakrishnan/CNBC) https://t.co/2Gg2NHnX18 pic.twitter.com/50ATMmxTIx
— Jeremy Lozier (@jeremy_lozier) 3 January 2018
Drugs giant Novartis (NYSE:NVS) added 0.86% as it received what's called a "breakthrough therapy" designation for its breast cancer treatment Kisqali.
The designation grants priority review to drugs with promising results in clinical trials.
Foodstuff group General Mills Inc (NYSE:GIS) may be in focus as broker Piper Jaffray upgraded the share to 'neutral' from 'underweight', pointing to higher quality brand launches and benefits from corporate tax reform.
Shares closed yesterday down 0.44% to US$59.04 each.