The final week of 2020 kicked off on a positive note, with US stock futures trending higher in Monday’s pre-market trading as President Donald Trump signed the bill to release $900 billion in coronavirus stimulus aid on Sunday night after previously criticizing the deal. The signing of the coronavirus relief aid and the government spending bill averted a government shutdown.
Futures linked to the S&P 500, Dow Jones Industrial Average and the tech-focused Nasdaq 100 were up 0.68%, 0.53% and 0.73%, respectively.
On the vaccine front, AstraZeneca’s (AZN) CEO Pascal Soriot stated in an interview with the Sunday Times that the company’s coronavirus vaccine developed in collaboration with the Oxford University “should be” effective against the highly transmissible new strain of the virus. The CEO said that new data will show that the vaccine is as effective as those developed by Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna, protecting 95% of patients, and is 100% effective against severe COVID-19-related illness requiring hospitalization. The vaccine is expected to be approved by UK regulators before Thursday.
Shares of e-commerce giant Alibaba (BABA) were down 1.5% in Monday’s pre-market session even as the company announced an increase in its share repurchase program to $10 billion from $6 billion. The enhanced share repurchase program will be effective for a two-year period through the end of 2022. Shares fell significantly last week after China’s State Administration for Market Regulation initiated an antitrust probe into the company’s practices.
Facebook (FB) is closing down its Irish subsidiaries amid tax disputes, as per a report by the Times of London. The US Internal Revenue Service sued Facebook for shifting funds through its Irish holding companies to avoid US taxes. The company used its Irish subsidiaries to hold intellectual property that had allowed it to shift billions of profits to the country where it was largely untaxed.
“Intellectual property licenses related to our international operations have been repatriated back to the U.S.,” the company said in a statement to the Times. “This change, which has been effective since July this year, best aligns corporate structure with where we expect to have most of our activities and people. We believe it is consistent with recent and upcoming tax law changes that policy makers are advocating for around the world.”
Dish Network (DISH) and Nexstar Media Group (NXST) have entered into a multi-year distribution agreement, which will restore Nexstar’s 164 local television stations and Nexstar’s cable network, WGN America, to Dish Network’s programming line-up. Nexstar’s local television stations and WGN America had been off Dish Network’s satellite system since Dec. 2 following a disagreement between the two companies.
Meanwhile, Nokia (NOK) has won a three-year 5G contract from Thai mobile operator, dtac, part of Telenor Group. Under the deal, Nokia will provide large-scale deployment of 5G on low-band spectrum (700-900Mhz) and high-capacity mmWave technology (26GHz). It will also be responsible for upgrading existing networks for faster data speeds to subscribers. The deployment is expected to begin later this year and is anticipated to be completed in 2022.
GameStop (GME) shares jumped 11.2% in pre-market trading, continuing last week’s rally following reports that RC Ventures, led by activist investor Ryan Cohen, increased its stake in the video game retailer to 12.9%. As per an SEC filing dated Dec. 21, RC Ventures now owns 9 million GameStop shares.
