Stocks Climb as Inflation Remains Muted – Wall Street Journal, 3/10/2021

• U.S. stocks rose Wednesday after fresh inflation data showed a muted increase in consumer prices for February.
• The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1.1% and the S&P 500 gained 0.9%, a day after the broad market gauge gained 1.4%.
• The Nasdaq Composite jumped 1.2% at the open as technology stocks extended their advance after they surged higher on Tuesday in one of the best days for the sector in months.
• Markets have seesawed in the past few weeks, as investors have watched yields on U.S. government debt surge amid expectations of both higher inflation and an economic recovery.
• Fresh data out Wednesday showed that a key inflation gauge rose 0.4% last month, in line with expectations. That may help assuage concerns that a sharp increase in inflation would prompt the Federal Reserve to tighten monetary policy.
• Investors are awaiting the auction of $38 billion in 10-year Treasury notes on Wednesday.
• The U.S. government’s extraordinary borrowing spree is starting to test investors’ appetite for new Treasury debt, which is also contributing to pushing yields higher.
• Asian stock markets were mixed. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 0.5% while Japan’s Nikkei 225 was flat.
• China’s Shanghai Composite Index edged down less than 0.1%.

Covid-19 Live Updates: Reported U.S. Cases Rise – Wall Street Journal, 3/10/2021

• Newly reported coronavirus cases in the U.S. rose, as some states widened vaccination programs to cover more people.
• The U.S. reported 57,417 new cases for Tuesday, according to the latest data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. Tuesday’s total was up from a revised daily tally of 44,758 cases for Monday.
• The country reported 1,947 fatalities from Covid-19 for Tuesday, bringing the nation’s total death toll to more than 527,700, according to Johns Hopkins data.
• Vaccination rollouts across the country are continuing to make progress.
• The seven-day average of daily doses administered has risen to 2.2 million, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
• More than 32.1 million people have been fully vaccinated against Covid-19, according to the CDC.
• Meanwhile, a laboratory analysis found that the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine retained its ability to neutralize new, more-contagious variants of the coronavirus, including one identified in Brazil, in a sign that the shot may offer protection against new strains.

Dick’s Sees Sales Easing After Pandemic-Fueled Growth – Wall Street Journal, 3/10/2021

• Dick’s Sporting Goods reported strong demand for its latest quarter but said it expects sales to slow down this year.
• The retailer on Tuesday said sales for its fiscal fourth quarter rose 20% to $3.13 billion. Profit of almost $220 million was roughly triple that of a year earlier, and adjusted earnings were ahead of forecasts from analysts.
• Dick’s e-commerce sales during the fourth quarter rose 57%, accounting for about one-third of total sales.
• Dick’s said annual sales, which rose nearly 10% on a comparable basis last year, could fall as much as 2% or increase by that margin this year. Per-share earnings are expected to decline.

Qualtrics sees full-year sales above Wall Street estimates but fourth quarter falls short – Reuters, 3/9/2021

• Qualtrics International on Tuesday forecast revenue would beat analyst expectations in the current quarter and full year, but the business software firm reported revenue slightly below forecasts for the fourth quarter.
• For the fourth quarter ended Dec. 31, Qualtrics said sales rose 24% from a year earlier to $213.6 million.
• The fourth-quarter results were toward the high end of the $211.5 million to $214.5 million range the company told investors to expect during the run-up to its public offering in January, but below estimates of $216 million according to Refinitiv data.
• Qualtrics generated an adjusted net loss of 2 cents per share during the fourth quarter, smaller than its net loss of 5 cents per share a year earlier.
• The company forecast net losses to continue for the full year of 2021 as it works to hit its revenue growth forecast of 34%.
• Provo, Utah-based Qualtrics projected revenue midpoints of $227 million for its current first quarter and $952 million for the full year. That exceeded estimates of $223 million and $943.3 million, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.

Disney crosses streaming milestone, aims to open California parks in late April – Reuters, 3/10/2021

• Walt Disney’s Disney+ streaming service has signed up more than 100 million paying subscribers around the world in its first 16 months, Chief Executive Bob Chapek said at the company’s annual shareholder meeting on Tuesday.
• Chapek also said Disney hopes to reopen its California theme parks to limited attendance in late April.
• The parks were closed a year ago due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
• The company is hoping for a comeback at cinemas this year. It currently is holding firm to plans to release Marvel movie “Black Widow” in movie theaters on May 7, Chapek said.

Boeing delivers 22 jets in February, net order turn positive for first time in 14 months – Reuters, 3/10/2021

• Boeing said on Tuesday it delivered 22 aircraft in February, up from 17 a year earlier, and that its net orders had turned positive for the first time in 14 months as COVID-19 vaccine rollouts boosted the confidence of its airline customers.
• Boeing said it booked 82 new orders in February, taking its gross total for the year so far to 86 planes.
• Customers also converted or cancelled around 50 orders last month, but the company’s orders net of cancellations still came to 31 jets last month, back in positive territory for the first time since November 2019.
• Boeing’s order backlog stood at 4,041 aircraft as of end-February versus 4,016 jet orders as of January.
• February deliveries include 18 737 MAX jets, three wide-body planes and one P-8 military jet, but no 787 jet deliveries for the fourth straight month.

GE to Wind Down GE Capital After Shedding Jet-Leasing Unit – Wall Street Journal, 3/10/2021

• General Electric Chief Executive Larry Culp is turning off the lights at GE Capital, a once-sprawling lender, and shedding debts that have hung over the industrial giant since the 2008 financial crisis.
• On Wednesday, GE agreed to combine its jet-leasing unit, GE Capital Aviation Services, with rival AerCap Holdings in a deal worth more than $30 billion.
• It will create a leasing giant with more than 2,000 aircraft at a time when global travel has been hobbled by the Covid-19 pandemic.
• GE will get about $24 billion in cash and 46% ownership in the new merged company. It will transfer about $34 billion in net assets to AerCap along with more than 400 workers. The deal is expected to close in nine to 12 months.

Flood of New Debt Tests Bond Market – Wall Street Journal, 3/10/2021

• Some on Wall Street see signs the U.S. government’s extraordinary borrowing spree is starting to test investors’ appetite for new Treasury debt.
• Over the past few months, falling bond prices have pushed the yield on the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury note from about 1% to more than 1.5%, around its highest level in more than a year.
• Another factor pushing yields higher, many analysts and traders say: the sheer volume of Treasurys now flooding the market—a byproduct of the trillions of dollars the government is spending to support the economy during the coronavirus pandemic.
• Net new supply of two- to 30-year Treasurys is expected to reach $2.8 trillion this year, according to BofA Global Research, up from $1.7 trillion last year and around $990 billion in 2019.
• The Fed, meanwhile, is expected to purchase $960 billion of Treasurys, down from more than $2 trillion last year.
• The impact of supply on Treasury yields is disputed on Wall Street. Some analysts are adamant that it historically has had almost no influence on yields and that growing levels of debt could even push yields lower over the long term by dragging on economic growth.