Investors welcomed comments by White House economic advisor Larry Kudlow over the weekend that the country was not engaged in a trade war with China. The markets rebounded to open higher with the Dow soaring 105 points to 24,037. Nasdaq climbed 56 points to 6971.
On the upside
AveXis (Nasdaq: AVXS) will be acquired by Novartis (NYSE: NVS) for a premium of approximately $8.7 billion.
Leucadia National (NYSE: LUK) will sell 48% of National Beef and 100% of its interest in Garcadia and announced plans to change its name to Jefferies Financial Group.
Citi lifted its price target on Alcoa (NYSE: AA) from $57.00 to $65.00.
On the downside
Concerns about the safety of Acadia Pharmaceuticals' (Nasdaq: ACAD) Nuplazid sent shares of the biopharmaceutical tumbling.
Deutsche Bank sold 23,362 shares of Yandex (Nasdaq: YNDX) in the fourth quarter.
MGIC Investment (NYSE: MTG) announced reduced borrower-paid premium rates.
In the broad market, advancing issues outpaced decliners by a margin of more than 3 to 2 on the NYSE and by more than 2 to 1 on Nasdaq. The broader S&P 500 gained 13 points to 2,617. Bitcoin plunged $253 to $6,746.
