Benzinga | Dec 14, 2020 02:33PM EST

Mid-Afternoon Market Update: Dow Turns Negative; Arvinas Shares Spike Higher

Toward the end of trading Monday, the Dow traded down 0.11% to 30,012.42 while the NASDAQ rose 0.97% to 12,497.37. The S&P also rose, gaining 0.05% to 3,665.27.

The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 16,257,360 cases with around 299,190 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 9,884,100 confirmed cases and 143,350 deaths, while Brazil reported over 6,901,950 COVID-19 cases with 181,400 deaths. In total, there were at least 72,336,160 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with over 1,613,740 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Consumer discretionary shares rose 1% on Monday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Liquidity Services, Inc. (NASDAQ:LQDT), up 11%, and Vuzix Corporation (NASDAQ:VUZI), up 10%.

In trading on Monday, energy shares slipped 2.8%.

Top Headline

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has authorized the emergency use of BNT162b2, the mRNA vaccine candidate developed by Pfizer Inc. (NYSE:PFE) and its German partner BioNTech SE -- ADR (NASDAQ:BNTX), for use in individuals aged 16 years and older, the companies said in a statement late Friday.

The U.S. has become the fifth nation behind the U.K., Bahrain, Canada and Saudi Arabia to approve a coronavirus vaccine candidate for emergency use.



Equities Trading UP

Arvinas, Inc. (NASDAQ:ARVN) shares shot up 99% to $59.67 after the company reported clinical program updates for its protein degraders ARV-471 and ARV-110. Interim Phase 1 data for ARV-471 showed potential for best-in-class safety and tolerability, with estrogen receptor degradation superior to what was previously reported for AstraZeneca's fulvestrant, the standard of care agent. The company reported robust efficacy signals in heavily pretreated patients with locally advanced or metastatic ER positive/HER2 negative breast cancer..

Shares of AnPac Bio-Medical Science Co., Ltd. (NASDAQ:ANPC) got a boost, shooting 35% to $5.68 after the company said it made significant progress in detecting pre-cancer diseases.

Veru Inc. (NASDAQ:VERU) shares were also up, gaining 38% to $8.77. Veru reported Phase 2 trial results for enobosarm for endocrine resistant metastatic breast cancer.

Equities Trading DOWN

Aerpio Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:ARPO) shares tumbled 48% to $1.18 after the company disclosed results from its phase 2 trial of Razuprotafib glaucoma. HC Wainwright & Co. maintained Aerpio Pharmaceuticals with a Neutral and lowered the price target from $2 to $1.5.

Shares of Destination XL Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:DXLG) were down 22% to $0.2440 after the company announced it would delist from the Nasdaq.

SolarWinds Corporation (NYSE:SWI) was down, falling 17% to $19.45 after the company said some of its products may have been affected by a highly sophisticated hack.



Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 0.6% to $46.85, while gold traded down 0.6% to $1,831.90.

Silver traded down 0.2% Monday to $24.04 while copper fell 0.1% to $3.5255.

Euro zone

European shares closed mostly higher today. The eurozone's STOXX 600 rose 0.44%, the Spanish Ibex Index climbed 0.96%, while Italy's FTSE MIB Index gained 0.27%. Meanwhile, the German DAX 30 gained 0.83%, French CAC 40 rose 0.37% and London's FTSE 100 fell 0.23%.

Eurozone industrial production increased 2.1% in October. German wholesale prices declined 1.7% year-over-year in November but rose 0.1% month-over-month.

Economics

On the economics calendar Monday, there is no important data due out.