Adam Vettese, UK Market Analyst at eToro, has provided his daily commentary on traditional and crypto markets for November 11, 2020.
European markets have opened positively once again this morning, carrying on the momentum from this week’s vaccine news albeit in a slightly more subdued fashion. The FTSE is up a quarter of a percent and US futures are signalling they will open up between 0.6 and 0.8%. The Nasdaq is looking the strongest of the three, after tech names sold off in favour of the beaten down value stocks that would benefit most from a Covid vaccine.
Tuesday was a calmer day in markets after Monday’s rally, with the S&P 500 close to flat. Boeing and Chevron were once again among the leaders in the Dow, gaining 5.2% and 4.6% respectively. That takes Boeing’s gain over the past week to 22.8%, with Chevron up 15.8% over the same period. Monday’s Covid-19 vaccine news has boosted both the prospects for international travel and the price of oil – which is now sitting comfortably above $40 a barrel. At the other end of the spectrum, Microsoft closed the day 3.4% lower, Zoom Video Communications was down 9%, and Nvidia lost 6.3%.
Politically, a new risk is emerging: the refusal of the Trump administration to begin transition proceedings for President-elect Joe Biden. With US Covid-19 cases running at record levels, a transition process without information sharing and cooperation from the incumbent could get messy.
Lyft says it will be profitable by the end of 2021
One stock making moves in after-hours trading on Tuesday was Lyft, after it predicted that the company will be profitable by the end of 2021 even if the recovery from Covid-19 is sluggish and ride volume doesn’t reach its previous highs. Having closed the day down 4.4%, Lyft stock jumped by more than 6% in late trading following its update.
The cruise sector faced a worse Tuesday, after Norwegian Cruise Line, Royal Caribbean and Carnival all jumped by more than 25% on Monday following Pfizer’s vaccine update. The trio fell back yesterday, by 6.6%, 2.3% and 13.1% respectively. Carnival was one catalyst for the sell-off, as the firm took advantage of Monday’s rally to announce it has filed for a new stock offering to raise capital. For its part, Norwegian delivered a disappointing set of quarterly earnings.
- S&P 500: -0.1% Tuesday, +9.7% YTD
- Dow Jones Industrial Average: +0.9% Tuesday, +3.1% YTD
- Nasdaq Composite: -1.4% Tuesday, +28.8% YTD
BT leads FTSE 100 with a 12.5% gain
London-listed stocks continued to rally yesterday, with the FTSE 100 up 1.8% and the FTSE 250 gaining 0.9%. BT Group led the FTSE 100 with a 12.5% gain, followed by 7.8% for packaging company DS Smith. Year-to-date, BT is still down 38%, although it has added 18% in the past week alone. Similar to the US, financial and energy names were also among Tuesday’s winners, with BP up 5.1% and Barclays gaining 4.6%. At the bottom of the FTSE, Ocado Group continued its tumble, closing the day 5.2% lower. The online grocery delivery firm is now down by double digits over both the past week and last month, although remains up by close to 70% in 2020.
The FTSE 250 was led to a 0.9% gain on Tuesday by outsourcing firm Capita and Cineworld, which climbed 26.9% and 18.1% respectively. Capita’s share price has been decimated by the Covid-19 pandemic and remains 80% down year-to-date despite a 30% plus rally over the last week.
- FTSE 100: +1.8% Tuesday, -16.5% YTD
- FTSE 250: +0.9% Tuesday, -13.1% YTD
