Mid-Afternoon Market Update: U.S. Stocks Turn Higher; Travelzoo Shares Slide

Toward the end of trading Wednesday, the Dow traded up 0.07 percent to 25,258.57 while the NASDAQ climbed 0.74 percent to 7,899.11. The S&P also rose, gaining 0.46 percent to 2,833.40.

Leading and Lagging Sectors

Wednesday afternoon, the information technology shares climbed 1.05 percent. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included GrubHub Inc. GRUB up 23 percent, and Attunity Ltd. ATTU up 22 percent.

In trading on Wednesday, telecommunication services shares fell 2.66 percent.

Top Headline

The Coca-Cola Co KO reported stronger-than-expected results for its second quarter on Wednesday.

Coca-Cola posted quarterly profit of $0.61 per share, on revenue of $8.93 billion. Analysts projected earnings of $0.60 per share on revenue of $8.55 billion.

Equities Trading UP

resTORbio, Inc. TORC shares shot up 62 percent to $14.59 after the clinical stage biopharmaceutical company reported positive topline results from a clinical trial. The company said clinical data from a phase 2b trial of its RTB101 therapy showed a statistically significant and clinically meaningful reduction in the percentage of patients with one or more laboratory-confirmed RTIs.

Shares of Nevro Corp. NVRO got a boost, shooting up 34 percent to $59.26 after the medical technology company announced a patent litigation update. The company said a court ruled in its favor with regard to six method claims in three patents.

ViewRay, Inc. VRAY shares were also up, gaining 33 percent to $12.72 following leadership changes. ViewRay named Scott Drake as President and CEO and Share Martin as COO.

Equities Trading DOWN

Helios and Matheson Analytics Inc. HMNY shares dropped 40 percent to $12.75 after declaring a 1-for-250 reverse stock split. Some traders and investors may erroneously see the stock up nearly 20,000 percent on some platforms. On a split adjusted basis, shares closed at $22.50.

Shares of Travelzoo TZOO were down 29 percent to $13.20 after the company reported weaker-than-expected earnings for its second quarter.

Agile Therapeutics, Inc. AGRX was down, falling around 33 percent to $0.31. Agile Therapeutics announced that FDA's Office of Drug Evaluation III affirmed the stance of the Division of Bone, Reproductive and Urologic Products, or DBRUP, by denying the company's appeal to the complete response letter for Twirla, an investigational low-dose, once-weekly contraceptive patch.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 1.23 percent to $69.36 while gold traded up 0.59 percent to $1,241.90.

Silver traded up 0.64 percent Wednesday to $15.62, while copper rose 0.60 to $2.8275.

Eurozone

European shares closed lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 slipped 0.26 percent, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 0.72 percent, while Italy’s FTSE MIB Index fell 1.43 percent. Meanwhile the German DAX declined 0.87 percent, and the French CAC 40 fell 0.14 percent while U.K. shares fell 0.66 percent.

Economics

U.S. new home sales fell 5.3 percent to an annual rate of 631,000 for June.

Crude inventories dropped 6.15 million barrels for the week ended July 20, the Energy Information Administration reported. However, analysts expected a decline of 2.6 million barrels.