Friday’s Headlines: Walmart Enters The TikTok Race

Here were the biggest movers in the MyWallSt shortlist yesterday:

Moving Up ⬆️

BlackLine (BL) +7.9%

Tripadvisor (TRIP) +6.3%

IMAX (IMAX) +5.2%

Planet Fitness (PLNT) +4.6%

Peloton Interactive (PTON) +4.5%

Moving Down ⬇️

Netflix (NFLX) -3.9%

Nautilus (NLS) -3.7%

Sea Limited (SE) -3.7%

Etsy (ETSY) -3.6%

Facebook (FB) -3.5%

1. It must have been hard for the Dow Jones (DIA) to be trailing its major index counterparts all these months, but the 30-stock average did finally turn positive for 2020 on Thursday, albeit briefly. The Dow climbed 160.35 points, or 0.6%, to close at 28,492.27 after Fed Chairman Jerome Powell said the central bank formally agreed to a policy of “average inflation targeting.” This means the central bank will be more inclined to allow inflation to run higher than the standard 2% target before hiking interest rates. Read the full story here.

2. If you haven’t seen the weirdest headline of the year yet, here it is: “Walmart is teaming up with Microsoft on TikTok bid”. Both Walmart (WMT) and Microsoft (MSFT) rose 4.5% and 2.5% respectively off the back of the unusual news, while it was reported yesterday that TikTok is nearing an agreement to sell its U.S. operations in the $20-$30 billion range. Walmart confirmed the move yesterday at a time when it’s trying to better compete with Amazon (AMZN), with its Prime competitor, ‘Walmart+’, also launching soon. Get the complete report here.

3. Workday (WDAY) shares are up as much as 12% pre-market after the cloud software company reported better-than-expected quarterly revenue and earnings. EPS came in at $0.84 on revenue of $1.06 billion versus analyst estimates of $0.66 on revenue of $1.04 billion, while total subscription revenue for the year is now expected to be in the range of $3.73 billion to $3.74 billion. The company also announced that it will have a dual CEO structure for the first time since 2014 as Chano Fernandez takes the joint-top spot. Get the official press release here.

More earnings from yesterday:

Ulta Beauty

Shares in Ulta have soared as much as 16% pre-market following its reported adjusted profits of $8.1 million, or $0.14 a share. While COVID-19 was expected to wreak further damage, sales fell 26% — less than expected — and e-commerce sales increased 200% year-over-year. Read more here.

Veeva Systems

If you didn’t get the memo yet, cloud is a booming business right now, as evidenced by Veeva Systems’ Q2 EPS of $0.72 on a 32.5% YoY revenue increase of $353.6 million. There is some concern though as the company failed to issue full-year guidance for now, while Veeva stock remains up 90% YTD. Read more here.