Wall Street fell from record levels today, fueled by health care stocks. The major indexes opened in the green, but reversed to close lower.
General Electric Co. (GE, Financial) fell almost 4% after Chief Financial Officer Jeff Bornstein announced his retirement. He will be succeeded by Jamie Miller. The company's marketing chief and top international executive are leaving as well.
Moreover, Ed Garden, co-founder of hedge fund Trian Partners, will take the board seat occupied by Robert Lane, a former CEO of Deere & Co. (DE, Financial) who is retiring after 12 years.
Stephen Tusa, a JPMorgan executive director and company analyst, wrote, "While not an implausible event, we believe the management changes at General Electric reinforce our view that core fundamental challenges are worse than consensus is currently discounting, with a new wrinkle added around possible outcomes from events this fall, almost none of which are positive."Â
He also rated the stock underweight. Yelp and Cantor Fitzgerald downgraded shares to neutral.
Year to date, the stock is down more than 25%.
Gainers
- Micron Technology Inc. (MU, Financial)
- Nvidia Corp. (NVDA, Financial)”‹
- Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT, Financial)”‹
- Philip Morris International Inc. (PM)
- Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD)
- Altria Group Inc. (MO)
- Apache Corp. (APA)
- Citrix Systems Inc. (CTXS)
Losers
- DaVita Inc. (DVA, Financial)
- Viacom Inc. (VIAB, Financial)
- Express Scripts Holding Co. (ESRX, Financial)
- Juniper Networks Inc. (JNPR)
- Symantec Corp. (SYMC)
- Envision Healthcare Corp. (EVHC)
- Medtronic PLC (MDT)”‹
Disclosure: The author holds no positions in any stocks mentioned.
