Before the Open (Mar 15)

Good morning. Happy Wednesday. Happy Fed Day.
The Asian/Pacific markets closed mostly down, but movement was minimal. New Zealand (down 0.6%) was weakest; Australia (up 0.3%) did the best. Europe is mostly up. Austria, Turkey, Spain, Italy and Norway are doing well; Greece is weak. Futures in the States points towards a moderate gap up open for the cash market.
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The dollar is down. Oil and copper are up. Gold and silver are down. Bonds are up.
The FOMC meeting is here. There’s nothing more for me to say that I haven’t already said the last couple days. The Fed is likely to raise rates. Wall Street expects it and wants it, so there should be no surprises. But today can still act as an inflection point, and it could be a few days before the market’s true reaction is known. Regardless of what the charts look like right now and what the indicators suggest, things can change suddenly after the announcement. You decide how much risk you want to take.
Stock headlines from barchart.com…
Netflix (NFLX -0.23%) was upgraded to ‘Hold’ from ‘Underperform’ at Jeffries.
Intel (INTC +0.06%) was downgraded to ‘Neutral’ from ‘Outperform’ at Credit Suisse.
WedMD (WBMD +0.38%) was downgraded to ‘Market Perform’ from ‘Outperform’ at Cowen with a 12-month target price of $55.
AMC Entertainment Holdings (AMC +0.49%) was downgraded to ‘Underperform’ from ‘Neutral’ at Credit Suisse.
Penn Virginia (PVAC -0.20%) was rated a new ‘Buy’ at Johnson Rice.
Snapchat (SNAP -2.42%) was rated new ‘Underweight’ at Cantor Fitzgerald.
NeoPhotonics (NPTN -5.05%) sold-off 13% in after-hours trading after it said it sees Q1 revenue of $67 million-$73 million, well below consensus of $98 million.
Achaogen (AKAO -5.75%) sank 10% in after-hours trading after it reported a Q4 loss of -$1.04 a share, a much bigger loss than consensus of -48 cents.
Endo International PLC (ENDP -4.22%) lost 2% in after-hours trading after an FDA advisory panel said that the benefits of Endo’s Opana XR no longer outweigh the risks.
FTD Cos. (FTD -0.68%) dropped over 8% in after-hours trading after it reported Q4 revenue of $280.7 million, below consensus of $282.5 million.
Rosetta Stone (RST +3.27%) jumped 12% in after-hours trading after it reported Q4 revenue of $51.7 million, higher than consensus of $48.1 million, and said it will provide Sourcenext in a license deal for education markets in Japan.
Fogo De Chao (FOGO -5.02%) rose almost 3% in after-hours trading after it reported Q4 adjusted EPS of 28 cents, better than consensus of 27 cents, and then said it sees full-year adjusted EPS of 92 cents-95 cents, above consensus of 92 cents.
Rubicon Project (RUBI -1.99%) slumped 14% in after-hours trading after it forecast a Q1 adjusted loss per share of -22 cents to -26 cents, much weaker than consensus of a profit of 10 cents.
T2 Biosystems (TTOO unch) fell over 3% in after-hours trading after it was downgraded to ‘Underweight’ from Equal-Weight’ at Morgan Stanley.
Today’s Economic Calendar
7:00 MBA Mortgage Applications
8:30 Consumer Price Index
8:30 Retail Sales
8:30 Empire State Mfg Survey
10:00 Business Inventories
10:00 NAHB Housing Market Index
10:30 EIA Petroleum Inventories
2:00 PM FOMC Announcement
2:00 PM FOMC Forecast
2:00 PM Chairman Press Conference
4:00 PM Treasury International Capital
Other…
today’s upgrades/downgrades from briefing.com
this week’s Earnings from Morningstar
this week’s Economic Numbers/Reports powered by ECONODAY