NASDAQ Stock Movers: VORB, FRLN, DISCA
3:57 pm Friday, January 07th, 2022
Richard Branson’s Virgin Orbit (NASDAQ:VORB) surged 17% as the recently de-spaced company rang the opening bell at the Nasdaq today and as Branson appeared on CNBC. Virgin Orbit went public last week and promptly dropped 12% in its second day of trading. VORB’s go-public deal appears to have underwhelmed investors in general, as the company raised just $228M cash through the merger instead of the roughly $483M that it originally expected. “Next week we have a big launch into space,” Branson said on CNBC. “That’s what we need to do. We need to prove to people that we’ve got something extraordinary and exceptional.”
Freeline Therapeutics (NASDAQ:FRLN) is falling pre-market from yesterday’s high which the company gained following the U.S. FDA’s greenlight for its gene therapy to enter clinical trials to treat Gaucher disease Type 1. Earlier in the Redburn analyst Robert Shore upgraded Freeline to Buy from Neutral. The company said in a Jan. 7 release that on Dec. 31 it granted four newly hired employees non-statutory options to buy a total 89.2K ordinary shares, as an inducement material to the employees entering into employment with the company.
Discovery (NASDAQ:DISCA) is getting an upgrade and price target boost from Bank of America, as the investment firm believes the risk-reward situation has become “extremely favorable” and the pending merger with WarnerMedia (NYSE:T) could make the combined company “a global media powerhouse.” Analyst Jessica Reif Ehrlich raised her rating to buy and price target to $45, noting that the combined companies have “highly complementary assets,” with WarnerMedia having “best in class film and TV studios,” while Discovery (DISCA) has “notable strength” in lifestyle, reality-TV and unscripted brands.
