Check out the companies making headlines in midday trading. Fortinet – The cybersecurity stock was the biggest advancer in the S & P 500 on Wednesday, surging 26% after Fortinet posted a strong second-quarter report, as well as upbeat current quarter guidance. The cybersecurity company posted adjusted quarterly earnings of 57 cents per share on revenue of $1.43 billion. Analysts polled by LSEG had anticipated earnings of 41 cents per share on revenue of $1.40 billion. Shopify – The stock popped more than 22% after the Canadian e-commerce company beat expectations for the second quarter. For the third quarter, Shopify said it anticipates revenue growth in the low-to-mid-20s percentage rate range compared to the same period last year. Analysts had expected year-over-year sales growth of 20.9%, per FactSet. Lyft – The stock declined more than 12% after the ride-hailing company posted softer-than-expected third-quarter guidance . Lyft sees adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization coming in between $90 million and $95 million. Analysts anticipated a forecast of $103.4 million, per FactSet. Airbnb – Shares plummeted more than 13% after the company issued weaker-than-expected revenue guidance for the third quarter. Airbnb expects revenue to come in between $3.67 billion and $3.73 billion, while analysts polled by FactSet were expecting $3.84 billion. Super Micro Computer – Shares of the server company sank 16% after posting an earnings miss and drop in gross margins during its fiscal fourth-quarter results. That overshadowed strong guidance due to ongoing artificial intelligence demand. Super Micro Computer also announced a 10-for-1 stock split. Lumen Technologies – Shares surged 40% after the cloud network data company posted second quarter revenue that topped the Street’s expectations. Lumen reported $3.27 billion in revenue, while analysts polled by LSEG sought $3.25 billion. Goldman Sachs also upgraded the stock to neutral from sell. Lumen has been on a hot streak this week after announcing $5 billion in new business, driven by AI demand. Upstart Holdings – The stock soared 49% after the company reported better-than-expected quarterly results. Upstart posted an adjusted loss of 17 cents per share on revenue of $128 million. According to LSEG, analysts were expecting a loss of 39 cents per share on $125 million in revenue. Novo Nordisk – Shares tumbled 8% after the Wegovy drugmaker posted disappointing second-quarter results and lowered its operating profit outlook for the full year. While the stock has run up more than 25% year to date thanks to optimism around its weight-loss drugs, the latest report is raising concerns it is seeing pressure from Eli Lilly’s Zepbound and Mounjaro. V.F. Corporation – The stock jumped around 12% following the company’s better-than-expected first-quarter earnings results. V.F. Corp posted an adjusted loss of 33 cents per share on revenue of $1.91 billion. That’s better than the consensus estimate of a loss of 37 cents per share on $1.85 billion in revenue, per FactSet. Sunrun – Shares spiked more than 12% after CEO Mary Powell revealed that the company is having conversations with many of SunPower’s former dealers and even bringing some of them on as partners. This comes after SunPower filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Monday. Global Payments – The stock rose around 8% after the company beat the Street’s second-quarter earnings estimates. Global Payments posted adjusted earnings of $2.93 per share for the period. Analysts polled by FactSet were expecting $2.91 per share. Amgen – Shares moved more than 5% lower after the biotech company missed Wall Street’s earnings expectations. Amgen posted adjusted earnings of $4.97 per share, below the $4.98 per share that analysts polled by FactSet were expecting. The company also narrowed its full-year earnings outlook. Rivian Automotive – The electric vehicle stock dipped more than 2% after the company’s net losses in the second quarter widened to $1.46 billion from $1.2 billion in the year-ago period. The company did top expectations for certain metrics, with an adjusted loss of $1.13 per share. Analysts surveyed by LSEG were looking for a loss of $1.21 per share. Advanced Micro Devices – Shares rose nearly 2% on Piper Sandler reiterating it as a top pick , anticipating “significant” market share gains within the traditional server market. Analyst Harsh Kumar sees upside for the stock of more than 30%. Reddit – Shares of the social news company sank 5.7% even after Reddit posted second-quarter results that beat estimates on top and bottom lines. Reddit also issued its third-quarter outlook, saying it now expects sales to range between $290 million and $310 million, while analysts expected $278.7 million. — CNBC’s Sarah Min, Jesse Pound, Samantha Subin, Pia Singh and Michelle Fox contributed reporting.
Check out the companies making headlines before the bell. Warner Bros. Discovery – Shares jumped nearly 9% after Warner said it will split into two publicly traded companies by next year. One company will host WBD’s streaming services and movie properties, while the other will include its cable networks such as CNN and TNT Sports. Tesla – Shares of the electric vehicle maker dropped about 2% after Baird downgraded the stock to neutral from buy. The firm said that CEO Elon Musk’s comments on robotaxi plans are “a bit too optimistic” and that Musk’s relationship to President Donald Trump adds “considerable uncertainty.” EchoStar – Shares tumbled 11% after the Wall Street Journal, citing people familiar, said the telecommunications company is considering filing for bankruptcy under chapter 11 . The company is trying to protect its wireless spectrum licenses that are under review by the Federal Communications Commission, the report said. Robinhood , Applovin – Shares of Robinhood and Applovin each fell about 4% after neither name was added to the S & P 500 on Friday, as both names were considered possible candidates for inclusion in the index . Robinhood soared more than 13% last week leading up to the rebalance announcement, while Applovin advanced more than 6%. IonQ – The quantum computing stock gained more than 7% after the company announced that it’s agreed to acquire Oxford Ionics in a deal valued at $1.075 billion in cash and stock. The deal is expected to close in 2025. McDonald’s – The fast-food chain’s stock slipped nearly 1% on the heels of a Morgan Stanley downgrade to equal weight from overweight. Morgan Stanley said the company hasn’t been insulated from pressures on the fast food sector. Moelis & Co. – Shares were marginally lower. On Monday, The Wall Street Journal reported that CEO Ken Moelis is planning to step down from the role at the investment bank. He said in an interview that he’s expected to become executive chairman, effective Oct. 1. Co-president Navid Mahmoodzadegan is slated to become CEO, the report said. — CNBC’s Alex Harring, Fred Imbert and Sarah Min contributed reporting.
People wait in line for T-shirts at a pop-up kiosk for the online brokerage Robinhood along Wall Street after the company went public with an initial public offering earlier in the day on July 29, 2021 in New York City.
Spencer Platt | Getty Images
Robinhood shares sold off on Monday as the online brokerage was snubbed in the latest quarterly rebalance of the S&P 500 Index after months of speculation that it could earn a coveted spot in the benchmark.
Shares of Robinhood dropped nearly 5% in premarket trading. The stock has rallied 3.3% Friday to bring last week’s gain to over 13% before the S&P Dow Jones Indices said after the bell that the S&P 500 would remain unchanged.
Just last week, Bank of America called Robinhood a top candidate to join the S&P 500 during the big reshuffling in June. The S&P 500 rebalance, which typically comes on the third Friday of the last month in a quarter, is usually an impactful event as it can spark billions of dollars of trading and spur passive funds to snap up its shares. Companies being added to the index can generally expect funds like that to buy huge amounts of their shares in the coming weeks.
Crypto exchange Coinbase was the latest beneficiary of such an inclusion. The stock skyrocketed 24% in the next trading session following the announcement last month.
Still, Robinhood has had a major comeback this year so far with shares doubling in price. The online brokerage’s shares hit a fresh record high last week amid a rebound in both stocks and crypto. The company had fallen out of favor after the GameStop trading mania of 2021 fizzled and the collapse of FTX triggered a sell-off in digital assets.
LONDON — Britain’s financial services watchdog on Monday announced a new tie-up with U.S. chipmaker Nvidia to let banks safely experiment with artificial intelligence.
The Financial Conduct Authority said it will launch a so-called Supercharged Sandbox that will “give firms access to better data, technical expertise and regulatory support to speed up innovation.”
Starting from October, financial services institutions in the U.K. will be allowed to experiment with AI using Nvidia’s accelerated computing and AI Enterprise Software products, the watchdog said in a press release.
The initiative is designed for firms in the “discovery and experiment phase” with AI, the FCA noted, adding that a separate live testing service exists for firms further along in AI development.
“This collaboration will help those that want to test AI ideas but who lack the capabilities to do so,” Jessica Rusu, the FCA’s chief data, intelligence and information officer, said in a statement. “We’ll help firms harness AI to benefit our markets and consumers, while supporting economic growth.”
The FCA’s new sandbox addresses a key issue for banks, which have faced challenges shipping advanced new AI tools to their customers amid concerns over risks around privacy and fraud.
Large language models from the likes of OpenAI and Google send data back to overseas facilities — and privacy regulators have raised the alarm over how this information is stored and processed. There have meanwhile been several instances of malicious actors using generative AI to scam people.
Nvidia is behind the graphics processing units, or GPUs, used to train and run powerful AI models. The company’s CEO, Jensen Huang, is expected to give a keynote talk at a tech conference in London on Monday morning.
Last year, HSBC’s generative AI lead, Edward Achtner, told a London tech conference he sees “a lot of success theater” in finance when it comes to artificial intelligence — hinting that some financial services firms are touting advances in AI without tangible product innovations to show for it.
He added that, while banks like HSBC have used AI for many years, new generative AI tools like OpenAI’s ChatGPT come with their own unique compliance risks.