Pre-Bell｜Futures Signal More Gains on Wall Street; Target Jumped 14% on Earnings

U.S. stock index futures rose on Wednesday, paving the way for fresh gains on Wall Street, as an encouraging inflation report fueled hopes U.S. interest rates have peaked.

Market Snapshot

At 8:41 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis were up 116 points, or 0.33%, S&P 500 e-minis were up 19.5 points, or 0.43%, and Nasdaq 100 e-minis were up 97.25 points, or 0.61%.

Pre-Market Movers

Target (TGT) reported third-quarter adjusted earnings of $2.10 a share, beating analysts’ estimates of $1.47, and shares of the retailer jumped 14% in premarket trading.

Advance Auto Parts (AAP) was falling 5% after the auto parts retailer posted a third-quarter loss of 82 cents a share versus Wall Street forecasts for profit of $1.44. The company also said it was initiating separate sale processes for its Worldpac business and its Canada operations and said it launched a cost-cutting plan of $150 million.

U.S.-listed shares of JD.com (JD) rose 5% after the Chinese e-commerce company reported third-quarter earnings and revenue that beat analysts’ estimates.

XPeng (XPEV), the Chinese electric-vehicle maker, reported a third-quarter loss that was wider than a year earlier and revenue that came up short of estimates. The company said it expects fourth-quarter deliveries of 59,500 to 63,500 units, better than consensus, and revenue to increase 86.1% to 99.3% from a year earlier. American depositary receipts of XPeng declined 1.5%.

Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.B) eliminated its stakes in General Motors (GM), Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), and Procter & Gamble (PG) in the third quarter, and reduced its stake in Amazon.com (AMZN) by 5%. Berkshire bought 9.7 million shares of Sirius XM (SIRI) during the quarter. Shares of broadcasting company Sirius were rising 7.8%. The changes to the Berkshire portfolio were disclosed in a 13F filing posted to the Securities and Exchange Commission’s website late Tuesday.

Nvidia (NVDA) closed higher Tuesday, rising 2.1%, to record its 10th straight gain, matching a record set back on Dec. 27, 2016. Shares of the graphics chip maker were rising 0.8% in premarket trading.

Earnings reports are expected after the closing bell Wednesday from Cisco Systems (CSCO) and Palo Alto Networks (PANW).

Market News

Tencent Logs Strong Revenue Growth as Games Sales Shine

China's Tencent Holdings (0700.HK) said third-quarter revenue climbed 10%, as its games business staged a robust recovery from a regulatory crackdown on the country's tech sector.

Sales for the world's largest video game company and operator of the WeChat messaging platform came in at 154.6 billion yuan ($21.4 billion) for the three months to end September, its third straight quarter of revenue growth. That was in line with an LSEG prediction of 155.8 billion yuan drawn from 19 analysts.

Michael Burry Closes $1.6 Billion Bet Against the Market With Huge Loss

Michael Burry reportedly closed a ‘big short’ trade worth $1.6 billion in nominal value against the $SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY)$ and the $Invesco QQQ Trust (QQQ)$. Burry was featured in “The Big Short” movie, with a massive win against the housing market in 2008.

However, the legendary investor’s most recent ‘big short’ accumulated estimated losses of 40% since its opening in August 2023. Gurgavin Chandhoke, CEO and founder of uINVST, reported the position’s closure and estimated results on November 14.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai Returns to Court to Defend Internet Company for Second Time in Two Weeks

Google CEO Sundar Pichai on Tuesday was summoned to federal court for the second time in two weeks to testify in an antitrust trial threatening to topple a pillar of an internet empire that he helped build.

In his latest court appearance in San Francisco, Pichai spent more than two hours defending the business practices of the Google Play Store, which distributes apps for the company's Android software that powers most of the world's smartphones.