Early Look

Monday, July 7, 2025

After closing at a fresh record high Thursday for the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite, stock futures are slightly lower to start the week after tariff headlines this weekend. President Trump said on Truth Social late Sunday that “tariff letters and/or deals” will be delivered from midday Monday and threatened an additional levy on countries aligning themselves with the “Anti-American policies” of the Bric’s group of emerging economies. “Any Country aligning themselves with the Anti-American policies of Bric’s, will be charged an ADDITIONAL 10% Tariff. There will be no exceptions to this policy,” Trump said. Meanwhile last week, the S&P 500 was up 1.72%, the Nasdaq up 1.62%, and the Dow was up 2.3% in an abbreviated trading week (S&P futures (Spuz) are up 9 of the last 10 trading days coming into the week). The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq closed at record highs on Thursday after a stronger-than-expected U.S. jobs report, while Nvidia shares spiked and its valuation neared $4 trillion. In Asian markets, The Nikkei Index fell -223 points to 39,587, the Shanghai Index was little changed at 3,473, and the Hang Seng Index slipped -28 points to 23,887. In Europe, the German DAX is up 140 points to 23,927, while the FTSE 100 is up 5 points to 8,828. After Thursday’s better jobs report, market expectations of an interest-rate cut in July have been reduced. Data showed non-farm payrolls increased by 147,000 jobs last month, 33% more than the 110,000 jobs forecasted by economists polled by Reuters. Unemployment fell to 4.1% last month, a better result than the 4.3% expected. In stock news, Tesla (TSLA) shares fall after CEO Elon Musk doubles down on politics, vowing to form a new America Party; MOH shares fall in the Medicaid sector after guiding Q2 and FY26 EPS below consensus (follows CNC recent guidance).

• The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 344.11 points, or 0.77%, to 44,828.53
• The Nasdaq Composite jumped 207.97 points, or 1.02%, to 20,601.10
• The Russell 2000 Index advanced 22.06 points, or 1.02% to 2,249.04

• Earnings After the Close: none

• OPEC+ said it will increase oil production even more rapidly than expected next month, as the group led by Saudi Arabia seeks to capitalize on strong summer demand in its move to reclaim market share. OPEC+ agreed to increase oil production by 548,000 barrels a day next month, exceeding expectations.
• @charliebilello noted yesterday, “It took less than 3 months from the April bear market lows for the S&P 500 to hit a new all-time high. This was the 2nd fastest recovery for US stocks in the last 75 years, trailing only the vertical rally in 1982 (note: including dividends).”

• Baker Hughes (BKR) said late Friday that the weekly US oil drilling rig count was down -7 at 425 (now down 54 vs year ago) in week to July 3 as the natural gas rig count was down -1 at 108 in latest week.
• Shell Plc (SHEL) said its Q2 results will be undermined by weaker contributions from the energy giant’s fabled oil and gas trading operation.

• Chubb (CB) downgraded to Equal Weight from Overweight at Barclays
• RenaissanceRe (RNR) upgraded to Equal Weight from Underweight at Barclays
• Travelers (TRV) downgraded to Equal Weight from Overweight at Barclays
• MarketAxess (MKTX) reports Q2 ADV $49B; Total trading average daily volume of $49B; Total credit ADV of $16.8B; U.S. high-grade ADV of $7.8B; Emerging markets ADV of $4B; Eurobonds ADV of $2.7B; Municipal bonds ADV of $643M; Total portfolio trading ADV of $1.5B; Total Open Trading ADV of $5B.
• Webull (BULL) shares slide after the company entered a standby equity purchase agreement with an investment fund managed by Yorkville Advisors. The agreement grants the St. Petersburg, Fla., company–which owns the Webull online investment platform–the option to issue up to $1 billion in Class A ordinary shares to Yorkville over three years and will allow the company to strategically raise and deploy capital.

• KalVista Pharmaceuticals (KALV) announced that the U.S. FDA has approved EKTERLY, a novel plasma kallikrein inhibitor, for the treatment of acute attacks of hereditary angioedema in adult and pediatric patients aged 12 years and older. EKTERLY is the first and only oral on-demand treatment for HAE. KalVista will launch EKTERLY in the U.S. immediately and physicians can begin writing prescriptions today.
• Molina Healthcare (MOH) said it sees Q2 adjusted EPS $5.50, below consensus $6.21, saying the preliminary results were driven by recent market dynamics and off-cycle disclosures from others in the managed health care sector. This preliminary result reflects medical cost pressures in all three lines of business. The Company expects these medical cost pressures to continue into the second half of the year; now expects its full year 2025 adjusted earnings to be in the range of $21.50 to $22.50 per share, reflecting a consolidated pre-tax margin of just under 4%, the low end of its long-term guidance range (est. $24.48).

• Autodesk (ADSK) upgraded to Buy from Neutral at DA Davidson and raised tgt to $375 from $305.
• Capgemini agreed to buy the provider of business process-management technology WNS Holdings (WNS) for $3.3 billion in cash, offering $76.5 per WNS share, which represents a premium of 17% to the stock’s closing price on Thursday.
• CrowdStrike Holdings (CRWD) downgraded to neutral from overweight at Piper after it surpassed the investment bank’s price target.
• Quantum Computing Inc. (QUBT) files for resale of up to 14.04M shares of common stock by the selling stockholder.
• TikTok is building a new version of app ahead of expected U.S. sale, The Information reports.