Yahoo Finance Trending tickers: Walmart | Applied Materials | Alibaba | LSEG
The latest investor updates on stocks that are trending on Friday
Walmart (WMT)
Walmart’s stock had its worst day in 18 months as the global retailer issued a wary earnings outlook for the current year.
Walmart posted a revenue of $160.8bn for its third quarter earnings on Thursday. Total revenue is up 5.2% compared to last year and is higher than expectations of $159.13bn. Its US same-store sales grew 4.7%, higher than the expected 3.35%.
Adjusted earnings per share came in at $1.53, versus estimates of $1.52.
The Arkansas-based company’s results are closely followed as a gauge of the mood of US consumers.
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"I think what's encouraging is that our traffic, our transaction counts, remained strong and consistent throughout the quarter," said Walmart CEO Doug McMillon.
Applied Materials (AMAT)
Applied Materials Inc. plunged in extended trading following a report that the Justice Department has begun a criminal probe into the largest US maker of chipmaking machinery.
Reuters reported that Applied Materials was under criminal investigation by the Justice Department for sending its equipment to a Chinese company without the required licenses.
The department is looking at whether Applied Materials sold hundreds of millions of dollars of equipment without the proper licenses, the news outlet reported, citing unidentified people familiar with the situation.
Applied Materials’ fourth-quarter report coincided with publication of the Reuters story. Earnings in the period amounted to $2.12 a share, excluding some items, the company said. Sales were little changed in the quarter, which ended Oct. 29, at $6.72bn. Analysts estimated earnings of $1.99 a share and revenue of $6.54bn.
Alibaba (9988.HK)
Shares of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba tumbled by around 10% in Hong Kong following its cancellation of a plan to spin off its cloud computing unit.
In its earnings release Thursday, Alibaba said that it would no longer proceed with a spinoff of its Cloud Intelligence Group — the cloud computing arm of Alibaba that competes with Amazon (AMZN) Web Services and Microsoft (MSFT) Azure. Alibaba had planned to list the division publicly.
The company blamed uncertainties due to US chip restrictions. The US has barred sales of Nvidia’s (NVDA) advanced artificial intelligence-focused chips in October.
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“We believe that a full spin-off of Cloud Intelligence Group may not achieve the intended effect of shareholder value enhancement,” the company said
London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG.L)
Shares of the London Stock Exchange Group were in the red even as the stock exchange operator raised its mid-term growth guidance and said it would return £1bn to shareholders in 2024.
London Stock Exchange Group plans to return £1bn to shareholders via buybacks over next year and has set a target to grow organic revenue mid-to-high-single digit annually, accelerating after 2024.
The group said in a statement Thursday accompanying an investor event that it now expected “mid to high single digit organic revenue growth annually” in the medium term.
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