U.S. Stocks Waver Amid Stimulus Bets – Wall Street Journal, 12/9/20

• U.S. stocks edged slightly lower Wednesday, suggesting that the major indexes may grind toward new all-time highs, as investors bet on fresh fiscal stimulus spending.
• Investors are optimistic Congress will pass another coronavirus relief package to bolster the economic recovery as rising infections prompt restrictions on social and business activity.
• The Trump administration proposed a $916 billion package on Tuesday after Democrats rejected an effort by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to narrow the scope of the bill.
• Lawmakers appear to be facing pressure to offer aid to those who have been hardest hit by the pandemic as infection levels and hospitalizations rise across the country. The U.S. reported more than 215,000 new cases for Tuesday.
• Some states have introduced fresh restrictions, triggering concern that the economic recovery could falter in the winter months.
• Investors are cautiously optimistic that the U.K. and European Union may strike a trade deal soon.
• British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is scheduled to talk face-to-face with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen over dinner in Brussels.
• In corporate news, shares of FireEye fell 9.7% after the cybersecurity firm said it was breached by nation-state hackers.
• The attack compromised the software tools used to test the defenses of thousands of customers.

Coronavirus Live Updates: Newly Reported U.S. Cases Back Above 200,000 – Wall Street Journal, 12/9/20

• Newly reported coronavirus cases in the U.S. rose back above 200,000 and hospitalizations due to Covid-19 hit a record for the third day in a row.
• The U.S. reported more than 215,000 new cases for Tuesday, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University, the first time since Dec. 5 that the daily tally has topped 200,000.
• New cases in California surpassed 20,000 for the sixth consecutive day, while Virginia reported its second-highest daily tally and infections in Idaho topped 2,000 in a single day for the first time since the pandemic began.
• In Washington state on Tuesday, Democratic Gov. Jay Inslee extended broad limits on gatherings, restaurants and other indoor activities until Jan. 4.
• North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat, said that beginning Friday he would institute a new, modified stay-at-home order, requiring business closures and people to be at home from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m.
• Hospitalizations across the country climbed further, with a record 104,600 patients in hospitals because of Covid-19 as of Tuesday, according to the Covid Tracking Project.
• Nationwide, there were 20,483 people in ICUs due to the disease, an all-time high.
• California officials have said the Thanksgiving surge there is expected to continue adding patients to intensive-care units for days to come.
• The U.S. reported more than 2,500 deaths from Covid-19 on Tuesday, bringing the total to more than 286,000.
• The seven-day average of daily U.S. deaths, which helps smooth out irregularities in data reporting, hit 2,237 on Monday, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of data compiled by Johns Hopkins.
• That is near the record 2,241 average deaths set on April 24, when New York and New Jersey were bearing the brunt of a springtime surge.
• On Wednesday, the Germany’s disease-control institute reported a record daily death toll of 590, and 20,815 new daily infections.
• Chancellor Angela Merkel called for tougher social-distancing restrictions ahead of the Christmas holidays and beyond. She urged the country’s 16 states, which are in charge of implementing measures against the pandemic, to further limit social interactions, including by closing shops from Dec. 24 until Jan. 10.
• France is reporting better progress in reducing infections. New daily cases have fallen from more than 50,000 in early November to a daily average of just over 10,000 cases for the past week. But French authorities have struggled to explain why the daily case count has levelled off at 10,000, a figure that is double the government’s official target for lifting the national lockdown in mid-December.

Two in U.K. Suffer Allergic Reaction to Pfizer’s Covid-19 Vaccine – Wall Street Journal, 12/9/20

• Two of the first people vaccinated in the U.K. on Tuesday with the Pfizer -BioNTech shot responded adversely to the injection, the country’s National Health Service said, prompting the regulator to issue new guidance warning those with a history of significant allergic reactions against having the inoculation.
• The two people are NHS workers, part of the first tranche to receive the vaccine on Tuesday in line with front-line staff having initial access, including those with existing health conditions. Both carried adrenaline auto-injectors to deal with their allergies.
• The agency said that the vaccine, which is administered in two doses at least 21 days apart, had triggered an anaphylactoid reaction in the two people shortly after they received the shot.
• Such reactions are triggered sometimes by drugs such as aspirin, certain anti-inflammatory drugs and opiates.
• The MHRA reminded health-care workers that vaccinations should only be carried out in facilities where resuscitation measures are available. It said it was seeking further information and would issue further advice following investigation.
• The U.K. is the first Western country to authorize a Covid-19 vaccine and on Tuesday began its vaccination program with priority recipients including health-care staff, people over 80 years old and residents and staff in nursing homes.
• The NHS said thousands of people received the shot on the first day of the rollout.

Campbell’s Sales Growth Cools Down – Wall Street Journal, 12/9/20

• Campbell Soup said a surge in sales brought on by the coronavirus pandemic is receding, a sign that the acute changes in consumer behavior early in the pandemic may be moderating even as many people stay home while Covid-19 cases and hospitalizations reach all-time highs.
• Sales rose to $2.34 billion from $2.18 billion a year ago, beating analyst expectations of $2.32 billion.
• Campbell’s U.S. soup sales jumped 21% in the quarter ended Nov. 1 compared with a year ago as pandemic-related restrictions continued to keep people home. However, that was less than half the gains Campbell reported for the prior three months.
• Campbell reported a profit of $309 million, up from $166 million a year ago.
• Campbell said it expects total sales to moderate in coming months, forecasting 5% to 7% growth for the continuing quarter.

GameStop’s revenue misses as store closures, digital competition bite – Reuters, 12/8/20

• Videogame retailer GameStop missed Wall Street estimates for quarterly revenue on Tuesday as pandemic-led store closures and intense competition from digital-game sellers hit sales.
• Revenue fell 30% to $1 billion, missing analysts’ estimates of $1.09 billion.
• The company’s shares were down 4.2% at $16.13 in extended trading, as it said comparable store sales fell 24.6% during the quarter.
• Net loss narrowed to $18.8 million, or 29 cents per share, in the third quarter ended Oct. 31, from $83.4 million, or $1.02 per share, a year earlier.
• The company did not provide a current-quarter forecast.

AT&T Enters Late Stage of DirecTV Auction, Fielding Offers Above $15 Billion – Wall Street Journal, 12/9/20

• AT&T received bids for its DirecTV unit valuing the satellite-TV service at more than $15 billion including debt, according to people familiar with the matter, as the widely watched auction winds toward a resolution.
• Among those submitting bids above that level was Churchill Capital Corp. IV, a blank-check company run by former banker Michael Klein, the people said.
• Apollo Global Management Inc., long seen by many as the front-runner to buy DirecTV, submitted a bid valuing the business at less than $15 billion, some of the people said.
• A deal could allow AT&T to deconsolidate DirecTV’s worsening financial results—a major aim of the transaction—while relinquishing control even as it maintains a majority stake in the business.
• The media-and-telecom company bought DirecTV in 2015 for about $49 billion, or $66 billion including debt.

U.S. Cyber Firm FireEye Says It Was Breached by Nation-State Hackers – Wall Street Journal, 12/9/20

• U.S.-based FireEye, one of the world’s largest cybersecurity firms, was hacked in what it said was a highly sophisticated foreign-government attack that compromised its software tools used to test the defenses of its thousands of customers.
• The company said the attacker also accessed some internal systems and primarily sought information about government clients. FireEye said it has seen no evidence so far that data belonging to its customers had been compromised from the primary systems used to store it.
• FireEye declined to comment on who it believed was behind the breach, which experts said could potentially be leveraged in future attacks against its customer base, including a diverse array of U.S. and Western national-security agencies and businesses.
• A person familiar with the matter said Russia is currently seen by investigators, including U.S. intelligence agencies, as the most likely culprit but stressed that the investigation was continuing.

Amazon eyes potential $100 million investment in India’s Apollo Pharmacy – ET – Reuters, 12/9/20

• Amazon.com is considering a nearly $100 million investment in India’s pharmacy chain Apollo Pharmacy, facing up to Reliance Industries and Tata Group in the country’s fast-growing drug market, the Economic Times reported on Wednesday, citing two people aware of the plans.
• Amazon already delivers medicines in India and the potential investment would come amid rising competition from Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance, which bought a majority stake in online pharmacy Netmeds.
• Tata Group, meanwhile, was reportedly in talks to pick up a majority stake in e-pharmacy firm 1mg.
• Amazon’s plan to further expand in India also comes close on the heels of its launch of an online pharmacy to deliver prescription drugs in the United States, increasing competition with drug retailers such as Walgreens, CVS Health and Walmart.

U.S. companies sitting on record cash pile – S&P Global – Reuters, 12/8/20

• U.S. corporations are sitting on record amounts of cash to reduce shock caused by the coronavirus pandemic, S&P Global Ratings said on Tuesday.
• Cash and investments owned by non-financial and non-utilities corporate issuers jumped 30% to an all-time high of $2.5 trillion in the first half of 2020, the ratings agency said a statement.
• Those companies have increased their debt levels by 9% to nearly $8 trillion, S&P Global Ratings said, adding that the U.S. Federal Reserve’s plan to maintain interest rates near zero for at least another three years will help companies that may need to take on more debt if the health crisis worsens.

U.S. lawmakers ask Intel, Nvidia about sale of tech to China used against Uighurs – Reuters, 12/8/20

• Republican Senator Marco Rubio and Democratic Representative Jim McGovern on Tuesday sent letters to Intel and Nvidia seeking information on the sale of advanced computer chips allegedly used by China to conduct mass surveillance on Uighurs in the country’s remote Xinjiang region.
• Rubio is chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee that oversees human rights, and McGovern chairs the Congressional-Executive Commission on China.
• The letters were sent to the chief executives of the companies, who were asked to respond to questions about their exports to China.
• The executives were also asked whether they knew their technology would be used to support surveillance activities conducted by China’s police forces and whether they took steps to ensure their products were not used for human rights abuses or to compromise U.S. national security.