The commercial space race just got hotter, Dropbox goes through the roof, plus more in today’s Closing Bell on Money and Markets.
The Top Story
Elon Musk’s SpaceX is looking to bring in around $250 million in a fundraising round as the company ramps up its three biggest projects.
The new fundraising efforts would value the company at nearly $36 billion — a $3 billion increase from previous fundraising valuations. This latest fundraising round is not expected to close until the second week of March, sources told CNBC.
SpaceX is in the midst of three large projects. Those include Crew Dragon — the spacecraft used to fly NASA astronauts to the International Space Station. Another is Starlink, which is a plan to launch satellites to provide global high-speed internet coverage.
The last venture is Starship — the company’s next-generation rocket designed to carry as many as 100 people to the moon and Mars.
This fundraising announcement comes in the same week publicly offered Virgin Galactic Holdings Inc. (NYSE: SPCE) transported its commercial spacecraft to its launch facility in New Mexico. Shares of Virgin Galactic have jumped more than 240% since December 2019.
Money and Markets: Closing Bell*
S&P 500: 3,337 (-35 points, -1%)
DOW: 28,992 (-227 points, -0.7%)
NASDAQ: 9,576 (-174 points, -1.8%)
GOLD: $1,642.80 (+$23.60, +1.4%)
BITCOIN: $9,691.34 (+$113.25, +1.1%)
U.S. 10-YEAR YIELD: 1.47%
*- as of 4:15 p.m.
A Big Win
In this morning’s Wall Street Wake-Up, we reported that Dropbox Inc. (Nasdaq: DBX) beat quarterly earnings and revenue estimates. It also raised its profit margin guidance. Shares of Dropbox rose 19.9%.
Shares of Deere & Co. (NYSE: DE) moved up 7% after the company posted a quarterly earnings beat.
M&A News
Investment bank Piper Sandler Co. (NYSE: PIPR) is planning to acquire fellow investment bank The Valance Group. The terms of the acquisition were not released.
The digital business unit of Witpro Ltd. (NYSE; WIT) is acquiring digital customer experience company Rational Interaction. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Golden Nuggets
A survey done by Kitco News found that analysts expect gold prices to continue its upward momentum as investors continue to worry about the financial impact of the coronavirus.
Gold futures move up 1.4% to $1,642 an ounce in afternoon trading. It was the third straight day above $1,600.
Silver also jumped 0.7% to $18.47 an ounce. Platinum futures dropped 0.4% to $974 while palladium moved above $2,600.
Cannabis Corner
Hightimes Holding Corp., the parent company of High Times Magazine and Dope Magazine received approval from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority to list on public markets.
The company said it plans to enter the retail cannabis market with a pair of dispensary locations in Los Angeles and Las Vegas.
High Times boasts more than 23,000 people who have become shareholders of Hightimes Holding Corp.
Stock Market Update
U.S. equities fell sharply after an escalation in coronavirus cases was reported in the morning.
The losses set the stage for the three major U.S. indices to suffer weekly drops for the first time in three weeks.
The Dow fell 0.7%. The S&P 500 dropped 1% while the Nasdaq fell 1.8%.
Today’s Big Winners:
Deere & Co. (NYSE: DE) +7%
Biomarin Pharmaceuticals Inc. (Nasdaq: BMRN) +6.1%
Mosaic Co. (NYSE: MOS) +3.9%
Gilead Sciences Inc. (Nasdaq: GILD) +4%
eBay Inc. (Nasdaq: EBAY) +1.3%
Today’s Big Losers:
Hasbro Inc. (Nasdaq: HAS) -9%
Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (Nasdaq: AMD) -6.9%
Nvidia Corp. (Nasdaq: NVDA) -4.7%
Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq: MSFT) -3.1%
Apple Inc. (Nasdaq: AAPL) -2.2%
Check back for the most important news and numbers each day after the Closing Bell, only on Money and Markets.
Don’t forget about “Marijuana Markets: a POTcast,” featuring the biggest cannabis news and investment notes from Banyan Hill’s Anthony Planas, here on Money and Markets each Saturday morning.