The three major US equities indexes opened slightly lower this morning following some more dreary news from Europe. Eurozone PMI fell in February to a lower-than-expected reading of 49.3, reawakening fears of a second eurozone recession (more coverage here). The news from Asia was also weak, with China announcing an expected GDP growth rate of 7.5% for 2012, the lowest since 2004. The DJIA is down about 16 points at around 12,962, the Nasdaq Composite is down about 4 points at around 2,972, and the S&P 500 is down nearly 3 points at around 1,367.
There are several stocks trading more heavily than usual this morning, and also experiencing large gains or drops in share prices. These include the TranS1 Inc. (NASDAQ: TSON), Archipelago Learning Inc. (NASDAQ: ARCL), Zynga Inc. (NASDAQ: ZNGA), Sino Clean Energy Inc (NASDAQ: SCEI), and Leap Wireless International Inc. (NASDAQ: LEAP).
TranS1 is up about 26% at $4.13. Volume is already about 7x the daily average of about 133,000 shares traded. The medical device maker received a code-change approval from the American Medical Association that incorporates one of TranS1’s devices.
Archipelago is up more than 22% at $11.07 after posting a new 52-week high of $11.21. Volume is already more than 150x the daily average of about 25,000 shares traded. The subscription-based provider of education products is being acquired for $291 million ($11.10/share) by a privately held competitor.
Zynga is down nearly -6% at $13.82. Volume is already about half the daily average of around 13 million shares traded. The social network game company’s stock was downgraded by JPMorgan today.
Sino Clean Energy is up more than 20% at $3.32. Volume is already about about 5x the daily average of around 516,000 shares traded. The Chinese provider of coal-water slurry fuel got a good review of its accounting practices late last week.
Leap Wireless is down about -9% at $9.60. Volume is already nearly equal to the daily average of around 1.8 million shares traded. The wireless carrier’s shares were downgraded at Bernstein this morning.
Paul Ausick
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