Although we don't believe in timing the market or panicking over market movements, we do like to keep an eye on big changes -- just in case they're material to our investing thesis.

What: Shares of alloy specialist Carpenter Technology (NYSE: CRS) were looking solid today, gaining as much as 12% in intraday trading on heavier-than-average volume.

So what: Carpenter announced today that it's acquiring Latrobe Specialty Metals from Hicks Equity Partners and The Watermill Group for a total of $558 million. Latrobe is a manufacturer of high-performance materials for industries such as aerospace, defense, and energy. Latrobe produced EBITDA of $58 million for the year ending in March.

Now what: It's relatively unusual for a company's stock to rise when it's the one making the acquisition. In this case, investors are likely looking to management's expectation that the acquisition will be accretive to earnings right away, which suggests that the company is getting a good price relative to Latrobe's earnings capacity. In addition, with $58 million in EBITDA on $379 million in sales, Latrobe will be bringing some higher-margin sales to Carpenter.

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