With Apple turning in a glowing Q2 report and several other companies entering into huge M&A deals, the Dow shot up 236 points with congressional talks resuming to hammer out the second pandemic relief bill.  With Q2 half way through, a record number of S&P companies have beaten estimates (and they’re still tempering this good news by saying that Q2 forecasts were dramatically low but hasn’t that been the trend the past few years anyway?)  Apple is now just 7% below the $2T mark in capitalization which would be the first company in history to reach that, just as it was the first company in history to reach the $1T mark.  It doesn’t seem like that was that long ago.  Apple is on fire!   Volume was just a tad below recent averages at 9.8 billion. 

                 mon  AUGUST 3, 2020 / 4:19 pm 

Nasdaq hits record high close as traders eye M&A and stimulus

Noel Randewich

DJ: 26,428.32  +114.67       NAS: 10,745.28  +157.46       S&P: 3,271.12  +24.90     7/31

DJ: 26,664.40  +236.08       NAS: 10,902.80  +157.52       S&P: 3,294.61  +23.49     8/3

(Reuters) - The Nasdaq surged to a record high close on Monday as a rebound in multibillion-dollar deals, including Microsoft’s pursuit of TikTok’s U.S. operations, lifted sentiment, and efforts to hammer out a coronavirus relief bill resumed.  Microsoft (MSFT.O) jumped 5.6% after it said it would push ahead with talks to buy the U.S. operations of Chinese-owned TikTok. President Donald Trump reversed course earlier on a planned ban of the short-video app.

ADT (ADT.N) soared over 56% on news that Alphabet’s (GOOGL.O) Google was buying a nearly 7% stake in the home security firm for $450 million in a deal that will allow it to provide service to customers of its Nest home security devices.  Varian Medical Systems Inc (VAR.N) jumped 22% after a $16 billion buyout by Germany’s Siemens Healthineers (SHLG.DE), while Kansas City Southern (KSU.N) gained after a report a group of buyout investors were considering a takeover bid in a deal of about $20 billion.  “The market is revolving around M&A activity possibly picking up,” said Jake Dollarhide, chief executive officer of Longbow Asset Management in Tulsa, Oklahoma. “It means CEOs are more confident about the future. Otherwise, why would they lay out billions of dollars?” 

 

Apple Inc (AAPL.O) climbed 2.5%, expanding its rally following stunning quarterly results and announcing a four-for-one stock split. The tech giant is about $140 billion short of hitting $2 trillion in market capitalization.  The S&P 500 information technology index .SPLRCT jumped 2.5%, far outpacing other sector indexes. 

 

Congressional Democrats and Trump administration officials resumed talks aimed at hammering out a coronavirus relief bill after missing a vital deadline to extend relief benefits to tens of millions of jobless Americans.  A rally in tech-related stocks and trillions of dollars in monetary and fiscal stimulus have lifted the S&P 500 to within about 3% of February’s record high.  The Labor Department’s monthly employment report is due on Friday, on the heels of last week’s weekly jobless claims data that showed a recovery in the job market appeared to have stalled in late July.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI rose 0.89% to end at 26,664.4 points, while the S&P 500 .SPX gained 0.72% to 3,294.61.  The Nasdaq Composite .IXIC climbed 1.47% to 10,902.80, beating its previous record high close on July 20. 

 

With the U.S. corporate earnings season now past its half-way mark, a record number of companies have beaten dramatically lowered estimates, but the second quarter is still set to be the low point for earnings this year.  Drug distributor McKesson Corp (MCK.N) jumped 6.5% after boosting its full-year earnings forecast.

Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by a 1.94-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 2.47-to-1 ratio favored advancers.  The S&P 500 posted 41 new 52-week highs and no new lows; the Nasdaq Composite recorded 164 new highs and 16 new lows.

About 9.8 billion shares changed hands in U.S. exchanges, compared with the 10.5 billion daily average over the last 20 sessions.