Johnson & Johnson, Nvidia, Palantir, Western Alliance, and more Stocks Making the Biggest Midday Moves

‍Nvidia

The stock of the chipmaker fell about 3% a day after Google introduced a supercomputer that it claims is the fastest and most energy-efficient of similar systems. The company claimed that, compared to the Nvidia A100, its chip is 1.3-1.9x faster and uses 1.3-1.9x less power than similar systems.

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Palantir Technologies

After Palantir announced that it was extending its partnership with Microsoft from the private sector to the public sector as part of its expansion into the public sector, the shareholder shares of the big data company fell about 5%. Through this development, Palantir and Microsoft will be able to offer enterprise-grade capabilities to customers in the U.S. government as well as partners in the industry.

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Western Alliance

The stock of the regional bank fell by 17% on a day after the bank stated that the bank had increased its deposit balance at the end of March to 68% as a percentage of the total assets. There is also a possibility that the remaining uninsured deposits of Western Alliance can be covered by its liquidity.

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Johnson & Johnson

As a result of this action, the pharmaceutical giant's shares rose 3%. It follows the announcement the day before that it would pay $8.9 billion in settlement of allegations that talc in baby powder and other products caused cancer. In addition, J&J filed for bankruptcy protection for LTL Management, which it continues to believe has no merit. 

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FedEx

It was announced that the shipping giant would merge its freight transport business with its divisions that provide other services into one entity after it announced that its shares would rise more than 1%. As a result of the move, FedEx is aiming to reduce costs while improving efficiency within its operations at the same time.

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First Citizens BancShares 

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UBS doubled up its rating on First Citizens BancShares to buy from sell, saying that the bank's acquisition of Silicon Valley Bank assets should be the catalyst for higher-quality earnings for the company once the acquisition is complete. For analysts at UBS, the decision seems obvious.

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Bed Bath & Beyond

In a surprise move yesterday, investors fell 6% on news that Bed Bath & Beyond had entered into a vendor consignment deal with Hilco Global's ReStore Capital, which plans to buy as much as $120 million in products from the embattled retailer.

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UnitedHealth, Cigna

A report by Raymond James that upgraded both UnitedHealth and Cigna to a strong buy indicated that the healthcare sector is doing well and the stock price looks more attractive as a result of an improving regulatory environment and increased valuations.

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Clean Energy Fuels

There was an upward trend in shares of the company after Raymond James upgraded it to outperform market performance, saying that the stock was a good opportunity to buy on a dip.

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Albemarle

The stock of Albemarle Chemical Corporation fell 6.5% after it was downgraded to underperform by Bank of America after it was previously rated neutral. We now suggest the stock could fall as much as 7% from Tuesday's close should the bank's price target be changed.

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Conagra Brands

According to FactSet, Conagra's stock rose 3% on concerns that it may have missed Wall Street's expectations on its top and bottom lines for the recent quarter. Conagra's profit outlook also received a boost.

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MarketAxess

As Piper Sandler reduced its earnings estimates for the first quarter of the electronic trading platform, shares of the company fell by 11%. The preliminary variable transaction fees of MarketAxess per million for the first quarter fell below Piper Sandler's estimate, despite the company reporting a record credit volume of $296.3 billion during March.

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