Trading Ideas

The deal, expected to be completed in the third quarter, will comprise $900 million in cash and $900 million in stock, Zynga said. The company has been strengthening its hold on the mobile gaming market through acquisitions and licensing agreements with media outlets to publish themed games of popular franchises. Zynga also raised its full-year bookings forecast to $1.84 billion from $1.80 billion, which excludes any contribution from the Peak deal. …read more […]

Authorities in cities across the U.S. used tear gas, curfews and arrests in an attempt to contain violent protests sparked by the death of George Floyd. WSJ reporters in Minneapolis, Chicago and Los Angeles describe the worst civil unrest to erupt across the country in decades. Photo: Alex Wong/Getty Images …read more […]

Officials worry protests against police brutality could result in a new jump in coronavirus cases; meat plants reopen, but beef and pork remain pricey; holy grounds around the world emerge from lockdowns. WSJ’s Jason Bellini has the latest on the pandemic. Photo: Seth Herald/AFP/Getty Images …read more […]

The Federal Reserve is about to do something stupendously insane.
It’s about to walk up to the free market, put a shiny revolver to its head and say, “Move… and you die.”
Gulp.
To the folks tuned in to the The View, eating potato chips and wondering if the girls will fight over the latest Twitter spat… what our boy Jay Powell is up to doesn’t mean a whole lot. As long as the credit card works, he’s done his job.
But, alas, ignorance is the fuel that fires Big Government. It’s what flames the mission creep that allows a central bank to pull …read more […]

Top news and what to watch in the markets on Monday, June 1, 2020. …read more […]

OPEC and Russia are moving closer to a compromise on extending current oil output cuts and are discussing a proposal to roll over supply curbs for one to two months, three OPEC+ sources told Reuters on Monday. OPEC+ decided in April to cut output by a record 9.7 million barrels per day, or about 10% of global output, to lift prices battered by a demand drop linked to lockdown measures aimed at stopping the spread of the coronavirus. Rather than easing output cuts in July, sources told Reuters last week that de-facto OPEC leader Saudi Arabia was leading …read more […]

Jun.01 — Morningstar Director of Asia Equity Research Lorraine Tan thinks U.S.-China tensions could be an overhang that leads to earnings pressure. She speaks with Yvonne Man and Haslinda Amin on “Bloomberg Markets: Asia.” …read more […]

Jun.01 — Chinese government officials told major state-run agricultural companies to pause purchases of some American farm goods including soybeans as Beijing evaluates the ongoing escalation of tensions with the U.S. over Hong Kong, according to people familiar with the situation. Leslie Vinjamuri, head of U.S. and Americas Programme at Chatham House, reacts to the news on “Bloomberg Surveillance.” …read more […]

Nordstrom (JWN) reported its quarterly earnings on Friday, and the results were grim. Net sales dropped 40%, worse than the 33% decline expected by analysts.The company recorded an operating loss of $521 million for the quarter for a loss per share of $2.23. This represented a decrease from net earnings of $37 million during the same period in fiscal 2019, and fell starkly short of Street expectations of a $0.95 loss per share for the quarter. Its shares closed on Friday at $16.13, down more than 12% for the day.Nordstrom shuttered all of its stores on March 17. Some reopened …read more […]

Jun.01 — Matthew Goodwin, professor of political and international relations at University of Kent, discusses President Donald Trump pivot to a law and order image amid the violent protests that are sweeping the country, how this could play out in the upcoming election in November and how coronavirus has impacted U.K. politics. Goodwin speaks on “Bloomberg Markets: European Open.” …read more […]

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Top oil exporter Saudi Arabia is expected to raise its official selling price (OSP) for all grades it sells to Asia in July, to track a jump in Middle East benchmarks although overall weak refining margins could cap price gains, industry sources said. Saudi Arabia is expected to increase the July OSP for Arab Light crude by $3.80 a barrel on average, a survey of five refinery sources showed. Forecasts ranged from an increase of $2-$3 a barrel to as much as $5 a barrel, as refiners’ margins weakened in May while a stronger DME Oman crude price, …read more […]

(Bloomberg) — Every year, John Gregson sells his autumn and winter truffles, carefully sourced from places like Italy’s Sibillini mountains and Teruel in eastern Spain, to restaurants for as much as 6,000 pounds ($7,400) a kilo. Not this year.His biggest restaurant customers brought their shutters down during the coronavirus lockdown, and many may not be raising them anytime soon — if ever. The unprecedented disruption in the food chain, with worst-case estimates showing 80% of restaurants going bust in some parts of the world, is leaving people like Gregson grappling with an industry that may take years to untangle itself.“Those …read more […]

Jun.01 — South African Reserve Bank Governor Lesetja Kganyago comments on inflation, monetary policy and the economy in an interview on “Bloomberg Markets: European Open.” …read more […]

(Bloomberg) — The Minneapolis Police Department’s website has shown signs of a cyber-attack since late Saturday, days after a video purported to be from the hacktivist group Anonymous promised retribution for the death of George Floyd during an arrest.Websites for the police department and the city of Minneapolis were temporarily inaccessible on Saturday as protesters in cities around the U.S. marched against police violence aimed at black Americans.By Sunday morning, the pages sometimes required visitors to submit “captchas” to verify they weren’t bots, a tool used to mitigate hacks that attempt to overwhelm pages with automated requests until they stop …read more […]