Stock Market Today: Dow Dips, Boeing Slides, and Oil Rises With Ukraine in Focus

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Stocks weren’t doing all that much Monday as markets digest last week’s large gains and the price of oil keeps rising. 

Dow Jones Industrial Average
futures have fallen 56 points, or 0.2%, while

S&P 500
futures were up 0.1%, and

Nasdaq
Composite futures were little changed. These moves come after the three indexes had their best weeks since November 2020.

“Futures are slightly lower following a generally quiet weekend as investors digest last week’s gains,” wrote Tom essay, founder of Sevens Report Research. 

Investors, flush with cash had been in dip-buying mode last week. Markets have digested that the Federal Reserve is expected to lift interest rates seven times this year to combat inflation, a move that will drag economic growth downward. Meanwhile, some encouraging headlines on diplomatic progress between Russia and Ukraine had emerged. 

Now, they’re trying to figure out what happens next. Oil might provide a clue Monday, WTI crude gained just over 4% to around $109 a barrel, and is now up more than 45% in 2022. That’s not helping a stock market that has had a difficult time seeing a sustained rally this year because surging oil prices could cause the economy to slow down, if they get too high.

Even after last week’s rally, the S&P 500 finds itself near 4,450 level, below the 4,600 level that put a ceiling on markets in February. Breaking that level could determine whether the current rally has legs or just a bear market bounce. “Near-term overbought conditions while weekly and monthly momentum remain negative create a difficult spot to chase this rally,” writes Fundstrat technician Mark Newton. “More conviction is needed.”

The picture was mixed overseas, where Frankfurt’s

DAX
rose 0.1% and Tokyo’s

Nikkei 225
climbed 0.7%.

Here are six stocks on the move Monday:

Boeing

(ticker: BA) fell more than 7% in the U.S. premarket. A Boeing 737 carrying some 130 people crashed in southwest China on Monday.

SAP

(SAP) fell 3% in premarket trading following news that the chief financial officer at the German software group would resign; Luka Mucic will continue in his role until into next year.

Warren Buffett’s

Berkshire Hathaway

(BRK.A and BRK.B) agreed to buy reinsurer

Alleghany

(Y) for $848.02 a share in cash, or about $11.6 billion. The deal represents a 29% premium to Alleghany’s average stock price over the last 30 days, the companies said in a statement. Berkshire’s Class B stock was just above flat in the Monday premarket while Alleghany stock shot up more than 25%.

Private equity group Thoma Bravo has agreed to buy business planning software-maker

Anaplan

(PLNA) for $66 a share, or $10.7 billion. The deal represents about a 46% premium to the volume weighted average price of

Anaplan

stock for the five days ended March 18, the companies said in a statement. Anaplan stock soared almost 27% in premarket trading.

Antofagasta

(ANTO.U.K.) rose 4% in London trading after news that the miner would notch a $900 million bonus from exiting the Reko Diq project in Pakistan.

Write to Jack Denton at [email protected]