Day Traders Diary

6/17/19

The major averages closed in the green led by gains in tech, as investors looked ahead to a crucial Federal Reserve meeting this week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 22 points to 26,112 while the S&P 500 closed 0.1% higher and the Nasdaq Composite outperformed, rising 0.6%.

The techs were led by Facebook (FB) on positive analyst comments ahead of their analyst day. Netflix (NFLX) also performed well up 3.2%. Among the sectors, the real estate rose 1.1%, energy was up 0.9% while the financials declined 0.9% and materials dropped 0.9%.

In M&A news, Array Biopharma (ARRY) and Sotheby's (BID) both agreed to be acquired for hefty premiums of over 60%. Array Biopharma will be acquired by Pfizer for approximately $11.4 billion while Sotheby's will be acquired by private investor Patrick Drahi for $3.7 billion.

The Fed is scheduled to start a two-day monetary policy meeting on Tuesday. Expectations for any policy changes are low, but investors will look for clues about potential rate cuts in July and later in 2019.

Separately, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said Monday that President Donald Trump is perfectly happy to slap further tariffs on Chinese imports if the two countries cannot reach a deal.

Reuters reported that Huawei Technologies CEO Ren Zhengfei is expecting sales to dip to $100 billion, or roughly $30 billion less than forecast, over the next two years due to U.S. restrictions. Reuters separately reported that several U.S. semiconductor companies are quietly lobbying to ease the Huawei ban.