Stocks made gains in fairly quiet trading Tuesday as investors awaited the outcome of the midterm elections. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI -0.11%) and the S&P 500 (^GSPC 0.02%) rose in the opening hour and then traded sideways the rest of the session.
Today's stock market
| Index | Percentage Change | Point Change |
|---|---|---|
| Dow | 0.68% | 173.31 |
| S&P 500 | 0.63% | 17.14 |
Data source: Yahoo! Finance.
Materials stocks led the market after falling sharply in October; the Materials Select SPDR ETF (XLB 0.07%) climbed 1.6%. Gold-related shares slumped, with the VanEck Vectors Junior Gold Miners ETF (GDXJ -0.41%) closing down 1.3%.
As for individual stocks, Booking Holdings (BKNG -0.47%) rose on optimistic guidance and Eli Lilly (LLY -1.81%) fell despite beating expectations.
Image source: Getty Images.
Booking Holdings climbs on a rosy outlook
Shares of online travel service Booking Holdings gained 4.2% after the company reported mixed results for its third quarter but gave an upbeat forecast for the rest of the year. Revenue in the company's busiest quarter grew 9.4% to $4.85 billion, exceeding Wall Street expectations of $4.82 billion. Non-GAAP earnings per share jumped 7.2% to $37.78, below the analyst consensus of $38.37, but above the company's pessimistic guidance given three months ago.
Gross travel bookings were up 12% from last year, which was a slowdown from 15% growth last quarter, but well above prior guidance. Room nights increased 13.4% and airline ticket volume was up 9.2%, but rental car days fell slightly. Booking has lowered its share count by 4% since last year as it aggressively buys back its stock.
Investors were pleased with guidance for Q4, which was for revenue growth of 13% to 16%, compared with expectations of 11%, and adjusted EPS of $18.90 to $19.40, compared with the consensus of $18.69.
Eli Lilly beats expectations on strong drug volume growth
Pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly beat expectations for third-quarter results and raised guidance for the full year, but shares fell 3.9% anyway. Revenue increased 7.1% to $6.06 billion and non-GAAP EPS grew 32.4% to $1.39. Analysts expected EPS of $1.35 on revenue of $6.05 billion.
Lilly saw strong volume growth of 12%, which helped offset a pricing decline of 4%. Last quarter, volume increased 7% and the effect of price changes was flat. The company got a 13.8% volume boost from its new drugs, but older drugs losing exclusivity also had higher volume than they have had in recent quarters. During Q3, the company spun off its animal health business through the IPO of Elanco, which also reported today.
Eli Lilly raised EPS guidance for the full year to a range of $5.55 to $5.60, up from $5.40-$5.50 previously.
