Another stop to the vaccine trial hurt investor sentiment on Tuesday, which also marks the start of profitability season and the unofficial start of the critical U.S. holiday season.
US stock investors have a lot to offer when the trading day starts on Wall Street.
News of a setback in a coronavirus vaccine candidate and reports of the first COVID-19 reinfection in the U.S. are hurting investor sentiment, while the official start of earnings season, the unofficial start of the U.S. holiday shopping season, and Apple’s iPhone launch event are all moving markets .
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 83.58 points, or 0.29 percent, to 28,753.94 when it started trading on Wall Street.
The S&P 500 – a measure of the health of U.S. retirement and college savings accounts – declined 0.03 percent.
And the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index gained 0.25 percent.
Johnson & Johnson shares fell more than two percent in the trading session after the pharmaceutical company announced it had suspended clinical trials of its coronavirus vaccine candidate because of an “unexplained disease” in a study participant.
Last month, AstraZeneca canceled a late-night study of a COVID-19 vaccine candidate after a participant fell ill.
The news follows more documented evidence that casts doubt on whether herd immunity to COVID-19 is possible.
Researchers from the University of Nevada confirmed the first documented case of COVID-19 reinfection in the US – increasing the number of confirmed reinfection cases worldwide.
Findings, published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases magazine, also said the 25-year-old Nevada man who was re-infected had a “more severe” illness the second time.
JPMorgan Chase & Co’s shares rose 0.66 percent after the bank reported third-quarter gains that exceeded analysts’ expectations.
The biggest surprise for avid investors, however, was that the largest US bank provided just $ 611 million as a cushion against acidic loans in the third quarter, compared to $ 10.5 billion it had provided in the previous three months. The reduced risk provisioning signals that the worst damage from the pandemic could be behind JPMorgan.
Delta Airlines shares were down 1.77 percent after the company posted another large quarterly loss as the pandemic continues to weigh on air traffic. Delta, the first major US airline to report profits, announced that its third-quarter revenue was 76 percent year-over-year.
The firearm unofficially launched during the critical U.S. holiday shopping season when Amazon launched its two-day Amazon Prime Day shopping event on Tuesday. The shares of the retail giant rose 0.071 percent.
And Apple’s shares fell 1.04 percent ahead of the iPhone maker’s much-anticipated launch event on Tuesday.
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