The major averages are mixed at midday as Fed Chair Jerome Powell and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin testify before the House Financial Services Committee. Powell's written testimony, released Monday afternoon, reiterated the sentiment from the FOMC statement that the economy has picked up from its depressed Q2 level and many economic indicators have shown "marked improvement," but added that "both employment and overall economic activity, however, remain well below their pre-pandemic levels, and the path ahead continues to be highly uncertain."
ECONOMIC EVENTS: In the U.S., existing home sales rose 2.4% to a 6.0M unit rate in August, which was better than analysts expected. The Richmond Fed manufacturing index rose 3 points to a two-year high of 21 in September, beating forecasts.
TOP NEWS: Shares of Tesla (TSLA) are 6% lower near noon ahead of the company's highly anticipated "Battery Day" event taking place later today. Tesla CEO Elon Musk said via Twitter last night that what the company will announce at its Battery Day unveiling will affect long-term production - especially Semi, Cybertruck, and Roadster production - but will not reach "serious high-volume production" until 2022.
Shares of Carvana (CVNA) have jumped 30% after the online car retailer announced that it expects to achieve company records in performance across several metrics in Q3, including retail units sold, total revenue, total gross profit per unit and EBITDA margin. Goldman Sachs analyst Daniel Powell upgraded Carvana to Buy from Neutral with a price target of $205 prior to the company having said it expects to be approximately EBITDA breakeven this quarter, while JPMorgan analyst Rajat Gupta upgraded Carvana to Overweight with a price target of $235 following the company's positive pre-announcement.
In other news linked to the automotive industry, auto repair retailer AutoZone (AZO) reported better than expected revenue and profit for its fiscal fourth quarter. However, its shares are down 1% near midday following the quarterly update.
MAJOR MOVERS: Among the noteworthy gainers was GameStop (GME), which rose 21% after RC Ventures disclosed an increased stake of 9.98% compared to 9% reported previously. Also higher was Fulgent Genetics (FLGT), which gained 15% after it was named to join the S&P 600.
Among the notable losers was Nano-X (NNOX), which fell 9% after Muddy Waters joined Citron Research in shorting the stock. Also lower was Kingsoft Cloud (KC), which declined 11% after it filed to sell 17.68M American depositary shares.
INDEXES: Near midday, the Dow was down 70.06, or 0.26%, to 27,077.64, the Nasdaq was up 29.31, or 0.27%, to 10,808.11, and the S&P 500 was up 4.33, or 0.13%, to 3,285.39.
