Stocks opened with nice gains on the heels of positive sentiment for equities in Europe and Asia. The market has been creeping toward its all-time highs and moved closer today with solid gains. The Dow was the leader throughout the session with a triple digit gain as earnings continue to move the market higher, though investors remain wary about trade war headlines. ECONOMIC EVENTS: In the U.S., the JOLTS report showed job openings edged up slightly to 6.66M openings in June. COMPANY NEWS: Shares of Tesla (TSLA) were halted for trading after founder and chief executive officer Elon Musk tweeted that he is considering taking the car maker private at $420 per share and has “funding secured.” Musk continued on Twitter, saying that he doesn’t have a controlling vote now and “wouldn’t expect any shareholder to have one if we go private. I won’t be selling in either scenario.” The tweets came after the Financial Times reported that Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund has built a stake of 3%-5% in Tesla, which is below the 5% threshold that requires public disclosure. Late in the session, an email that was sent to Tesla employees today by Musk explaining his rationale for why he thinks it would be best if Tesla went private was disclosed by the company on its blog. Tesla finished with a gain of 11% at $379.57 per share… Meanwhile, in an open letter to investors, Carl Icahn urged shareholders to vote against Cigna’s (CI) $54B deal for Express Scripts (ESRX), arguing that the former is “dramatically overpaying” for a company “facing existential risks on several fronts.” The billionaire investor went on to say that “opposition to the highly flawed rebate system will likely lower Express Scripts’ profitability dramatically” and that competitive risk from Amazon (AMZN), “arguably the strongest competitor in the world,” will possibly challenge the “very existence” of PBMs like Express Scripts. MAJOR MOVERS: Among the noteworthy gainers was Etsy (ETSY), which rose 3% after it reported quarterly results and raised its fiscal 2018 guidance for revenue and GMS. Also higher after reporting quarterly results were Hertz (HTZ) and Twilio (TWLO), which gained a respective 25% and 19%. Among the notable losers was Spark Therapeutics (ONCE), which dropped 28% after the company announced preliminary Phase 1/2 data for its investigational gene therapy candidate SPK-8011 for hemophilia A. Also lower were Zillow (ZG) and Dean Foods (DF), which fell 16% and 15%, respectively, after reporting quarterly results. INDEXES: The Dow rose 126.73, or 0.50%, to 25,628.91, the Nasdaq gained 23.99, or 0.31%, to 7,883.66, and the S&P 500 advanced 8.05, or 0.28%, to 2,858.45.
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