Tag Archives: technology

5 Big-Name Medical Stocks Show Notable Chart Action

Loading the player… There’s a lot of news breaking in the medical sector today. Let’s take a look at five medical-related stocks with notable charts: Valeant Pharmaceuticals ( VRX ), Eli Lilly ( LLY ), Teva Pharmaceuticals ( TEVA ), Inogen ( INGN ) and Ligand Pharmaceuticals ( LGND ). Valeant Plunges On Results Valeant reported preliminary fourth-quarter earnings that missed expectations and slashed its guidance. The specialty drugmaker warned that it could potentially default if it doesn’t file its annual report by an April deadline. Valeant’s financials are under an ongoing review after a scandal broke out last fall. Shares plunged more than 50% in giant volume, hitting their lowest level in four years. The stock is now trading at 86% below its all-time high reached last August. Late-Stage Trial Change Hits Lilly Eli Lilly crumbled as much as 6% after announcing it’s changing the goal of the phase-three clinical trial for its Alzheimer’s treatment, signaling that the drug can only treat cognitive capabilities and not functional capabilities as well. The decline came in big turnover, and sent shares to a one-year low in intraday trade. Lilly is now 23% below its high reached in September. Teva’s Acquisition Delayed Teva Pharma’s $40.5 billion acquisition of Allergan’s generics unit has been delayed until June as it works to get regulators’ approval. Shares dropped more than 5% in intraday trade. Volume was heavy. Shares are now trading 14% below a consolidation buy point and 21% below their July high. Inogen Beats Views Inogen reported better-than-expected quarterly results on Tuesday. The company makes oxygen tanks for chronic respiratory conditions. The gap-up put shares above their 200-day line in intraday trade, but the stock was struggling to hold above that level as it pared some of its gains. Inogen was able to retake the 50-day line in Monday’s session. It’s now about 27% below its September peak. IBD 50’s Ligand Basing Meanwhile, IBD 50 stock Ligand Pharma is working on a double-bottom base with a potential buy point at 106.08. Shares are currently trading about 7% below the pivot.

Notebook Blahs, Broadwell Timing Could Slug Intel Q1: Analyst

A Needham analyst trimmed his Intel ( INTC ) Q1 sales views by $500 million Tuesday amid declining PC sales and delayed data center sales, and ahead of the March 31 Broadwell CPU launch. He retained his estimates for the balance of the year, however. In afternoon trading on the stock market today , Intel stock was up a fraction, near 31.50. But shares are down 9% this year on Wall Street due to concerns that PC sales will hit a slump in Q1. Needham’s N. Quinn Bolton is the most recent in a series of analysts to cut expectations. For Q1, Bolton sees $13.6 billion in sales and 46 cents earnings per share ex items, vs. earlier views for $14.1 billion and 50 cents. The largest chunk — $400 million — came out of Intel’s client computing group. Cumulative notebook shipments from Taiwan’s five leading notebook makers fell 32.7% sequentially and 15.7% year over year in January and February, Bolton wrote in a research report. Notebook shipments haven’t been flat in March since 2011. If they are in 2016, he models a 23.3% sequential and 9.7% year-over-year decline in Q1 shipments. Bolton expects Q1 notebook shipments to decline 14.2% quarter over quarter and 3.5% vs. the year-earlier quarter. For Intel, that means $7.44 billion in sales vs. earlier expectations for $7.84 billion. The new model would be relatively flat year over year. He also chopped $100 million off his data center group expectations, noting a potential pause in enterprise data center shopping ahead of the launch of new Intel server chip Broadwell this month. Last year, Intel pulled in $3.7 billion in data center sales. Intel Might Soon Update Its Guidance After Q1, Bolton sees a return to spending. “The weak notebook shipments likely are a result of inventory clearance in the PC channel, and we expect data center group revenue to rebound in Q2 following the Broadwell launch,” he wrote. “We are not changing our Q2, Q3 and Q4 estimates at this time.” Intel could update guidance this week before entering a quarterly quiet period Friday. Per company policy, Intel updates guidance if business appears to be tracking outside the range of original expectations. In January, Intel guided to $14.1 billion, plus or minus $500 million, in current-quarter sales. “Should the company enter the quiet period with no revision to guidance, our new estimates will likely prove conservative,” Bolton wrote. Last month, Nomura analyst Romit Shah lowered his Q1 sales forecast for Intel , modeling a 20% sequential decline vs. earlier views for a 7% decline. In January, a Citigroup analyst modeled a 20%-25% quarter-over-quarter fall in Q1 notebook shipments. But, like Bolton, Shah retained his buy rating on Intel stock, noting Q1 is typically a “back-end loaded quarter.”

Amazon.com, GrubHub Under Fire From Uber Restaurant Delivery

Ride-booking firm Uber announced in a blog post Tuesday that it was expanding its restaurant delivery service and spinning it off from the main Uber mobile app. Called UberEats, the food delivery app will add competitive pressure to Amazon.com ( AMZN ) and GrubHub ( GRUB ), both of which have competing restaurant delivery offerings. GrubHub stock was down 5% in early afternoon trading in the stock market today , while Amazon stock was flat. UberEats is an expansion of the company’s “instant delivery” service, which offers a fixed menu and deliveries in “as little as 10 minutes.” UberEats is partnering with “hundreds” of restaurants to make food delivery available seven days a week, according to the company’s blog. Cowen analyst Kevin Kopelman conducted tests of UberEats in Santa Monica, Calif., and found that the app’s estimates — 30 minutes or less, with a midpoint around 11 minutes — beat Amazon Prime Now Restaurants’ nationwide average of 39 minutes. GrubHub does not provide precise timing information because it doesn’t make the delivery itself, Kopelman pointed out in a research note Monday. Amazon offers estimates “within the hour.” Kopelman says that UberEats has changed to curbside delivery only, which means that drivers will not meet customers at the door, as is the norm in food delivery. Kopelman says that changing to curbside lets the company more easily integrate existing drivers for UberX — its taxi-like service, where drivers use personal cars to ferry passengers — which the firm is using as a primary source for delivery recruitment. An Uber spokeswoman told IBD that the company’s “instant delivery” is curbside, but she added that its regular restaurant delivery “in most cases” is door-to-door. Unlike Amazon and GrubHub, UberEats does not allow tipping within the app — though customers can give the driver a cash tip — and its fees are among the lowest among its competitors, according to Kopelman. Amazon does not charge a delivery fee, at least for now. “Our initial impressions of UberEats in Los Angeles make us incrementally more cautious on the competitive environment for GrubHub,” Kopelman wrote. The UberEats app and curbside restaurant delivery are set to roll out in Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Toronto, according to the company’s blog. Seven other major markets are set to open “around the corner” — including Melbourne, New York and Paris. Troubled Market But if startups are any indication, then UberEats, Amazon and GrubHub are vying for a market that is looking at a troubled future. Tuesday, TechCrunch reported that SpoonRocket, a food delivery app, is shutting down amid the “on-demand apocalypse,” referring to the big challenges of the food deliveries business. And Monday, the Wall Street Journal published a report  saying that grocery delivery app Instacart, valued at over $2 billion, is slashing its driver pay 63% in a bid for profitability. The WSJ also pointed out that such on-demand delivery companies are attempting to avoid repeating history. In the dot-com bust, heralded grocery delivery startup Webvan Group burned through $800 million before shutting down in 2001.