Last Week’s Top Stock Movers: Falling Down with a Kardashian
Filed under: Company News, Earnings, Market News, Mergers & Acquisitions, Investing
Plenty of stocks go up and down in any given week. The gainers inspire us to keep investing. The decliners keep greed in check while reminding us about the risks of the equity markets.
Let’s go over some of last week’s best and worst performers.
Unilife (UNIS) — Up 21 percent last week
Shares of Unilife moved nicely higher earlier in the week after the company struck a deal to be the lone provider of wearable injectors for Sanofi (SNY). The 15-year commercial supply agreement finds Unilife working with all of Sanofi’s large-dose volume drugs outside of insulin.
Ruby Tuesday (RT) — Up 15 percent last week
Casual-dining chain Ruby Tuesday moved higher after posting encouraging quarterly results. Ruby Tuesday may have posted another loss, but the penny-a-share deficit was a lot less than it posted a year earlier and well ahead of what analysts were anticipating.
Ruby Tuesday also came through with a year-over-year increase in restaurant traffic and comparable-unit sales. The chain also boosted its outlook for margins and restaurant-level sales for the entire fiscal year.
Becton, Dickinson (BDX) — Up 10 percent last week
A merger in the medical products industry boosted the prospects of both the buyer and seller. Becton, Dickinson announced that it would be snapping up CareFusion (CFN) in a $12 billion deal.
Usually the acquirer’s stock takes a hit. It’s paying a premium, after all. However, analysts were generally intrigued by the combination that would help Becton, Dickinson expand into new areas of medical products and services. Stifel Nicolaus upgraded the stock on the news.
GT Advanced Technologies (GTAT) — Down 93 percent last week
The biggest loser of last week was GT Advanced Technologies, plummeting after announcing that it would have to cut 890 jobs, close an Arizona plant and file for bankruptcy after Apple (AAPL) chose not to go with its Sapphire scratch-resistant screens.
GT Advanced Technologies had been a market darling before that as a way to ride the coattails of Apple’s smartphone and tablet success. Unfortunately for GT, it was putting all of its eggs in the same iBasket.
Caesars Entertainment (CZR) — Down 24 percent last week
Caesars took a hit after some bondholders declared that it was in default. A trustee holding $3.7 billion of debt in the casino operator is saying that its inability to have a claim on certain assets places Caesars in default. Things only got worse for Caesars after its chief accounting officer announced that she was leaving the company. The market’s not happy when key bean counters bolt.
Glu Mobile (GLUU) — Down 19 percent last week
When you live by Kim Kardashian, you die by Kim Kardashian. Shares of Glu Mobile were a hot ticket earlier this year when a mobile gaming app themed to Kardashian erupted in popularity. However, the summertime smartphone smash is now starting to cool off. A report earlier in the week pointed out that the App Store download ranking of “Kim Kardashian: Hollywood” has gone from 69 to 163 over the past month.
That’s not fatal. Initial downloads can slide over time, and that’s fine as long as the existing base of users keep playing. Well, the same report finds that “Kim Kardashian: Hollywood” has also taken a hit in terms of highest-grossing apps, going from No. 5 to No. 15 over the past month.
Motley Fool contributor Rick Munarriz has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends Apple and Becton, Dickinson. The Motley Fool owns shares of Apple and is short Caesars Entertainment. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. To read about our favorite high-yielding dividend stocks for any investor, check out our free report.
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