Kohl’s jumps on activist investor agitation, airlines sink, Rivian tumbles

Yahoo Finance's Emily McCormick and Adam Shapiro discuss today's trending stocks.

Video transcript

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EMILY MCCORMICK: It's time now for our "2 & 2." Two stocks I'm watching, and two stocks Adam is watching during today's session. Let's take a look first at shares of Kohl's. Now this stock was up more than 9% at session highs earlier today in its biggest jump in six weeks. Now that's after Macellum advisors sent a letter to Kohl's, saying that the company should explore options, including a potential sale if it doesn't boost business enough to help increase its stock price.

Now Macellum has about 5% stake in Kohl's and has urged the company to make changes, including to its board. And among the list of issues is that Kohl's shares have fallen by more than 20% since April 2021 when Kohl's initially agreed to add two of Macellum's nominees to its board of independent directors.

Now, Jonathan Duskin, CEO of Macellum, was on Yahoo Finance earlier today and told our own Brian Sozzi, quote, "I know the board needs more help. I know they need a shareholder in the room that has a sense of urgency, that has a real understanding of retail and the dynamic and the competitive landscape. And I think we can be really be incredibly beneficial to Michelle--" that's Michelle Gass, the CEO of Kohl's-- "and help her improve the business and turn this company around and create meaningful value for shareholders."

Now separately, Reuters also reported that Acacia Research had reached out to Kohl's to express interest in making a bid for that company. So likely more that we'll be hearing in the coming weeks about activist investor activity with Kohl's. But again, for now, that stock moving higher on this news. Then there're shares of Citrix Systems-- and we're staying with the theme of activist investor action here because this stock is also moving higher today after a report from Bloomberg that the company is in talks to be purchased by Elliott Investment Management and Vista Equity Partners.

Now Elliott had already taken about 10% stake in the software company Citrix Systems back in September. And Bloomberg had also previously reported late last year that Citrix was exploring options, including a sale. Those shares have been under pressure recently, and they're down more than 20% over the past 52 weeks and have sharply performed the S&P 500. Although as we can see, this stock is bucking the downward trend of the broader market up about 5% during intraday trading. Adam.

ADAM SHAPIRO: Emily, I want to pay attention to the airlines. And we call it a five board. Let's pull up five of the largest airlines. You've got United, American, Delta, Southwest, JetBlue. They're trading down today. We're going to hear by the way this week. Tomorrow after the bell, United's going to be reporting. We will get American Airlines on the 20th, on Thursday. They are reporting before the bell.

But what's at play today, one, the price of oil. That's a crimp on all of this. But there was the whole kerfuffle over 5G. At this moment in time, Verizon and AT&T have agreed with a deal that the airlines wanted, and that the administration helped broker. They will not be powering up 5G within a two-mile radius of certain airports.

Now 5G will go live at 12:01 AM Wednesday morning. But if you're two miles, say, close to an airport like Chicago O'Hare, or JFK here in New York, Atlanta Hartsfield, the 5G won't be what you expect. This all has to do with transmission within the C-band. And there's concern that these transmissions could interfere with the radio signals, with altimeters, and airplane guidance systems. The Biden administration is promising to chart-- quote-- "chart a path forward for 5G deployment and aviation to safely coexist." In other words, stay tuned, fasten your seatbelts. Nobody's saying bye, bye just yet.

Take a look at Rivian shares right now. When you take a look at Rivian, they were trading below the IPO, which was $78. And they continue to do that. In fact, that low at one point, they were at $74. That was an intraday low. But now they have fallen down almost 8%.

A couple of things are going on though with Rivian. They were just upgraded last week to buy from Redburn Partners. And we also know that their current production capacity now that they're making trucks, electric trucks at that, 150,000, although they are investing to raise that number to 200,000 and plan to break ground on a factory in Georgia to build trucks in 2024. But as of right now, Rivian taking a hit, especially when you consider what's happening to a lot of tech stocks, given interest rates.