JD Sports buys US-based Shoe Palace, AstraZeneca gets recommendation for new 'Imfinzi' dose

Stocks to watch

JD Sports Fashion said it has bought US-based Shoe Palace for $325m along with an equity share in the enlarged group for the company’s founders. Based in San Jose, California, Shoe Palace was established in 1993 by the Mersho family and currently has 167 stores, most of which trade under the Shoe Palace banner. It is operated by four brothers from the Mersho family who head up the various operating functions across the business and will receive a 20% stake of the US business worth around $356m.

AstraZeneca announced on Tuesday that ‘Imfinzi’, or durvalumab, has been recommended for marketing authorisation in the European Union for an additional dosing option, 1,500mg fixed dose every four weeks, in the approved indication of locally advanced, unresectable non-small cell lung cancer in adults whose tumours expressed PD-L1 on at least 1% of tumour cells and whose disease had not progressed following platinum-based chemoradiation therapy. It said the new dosing option was consistent with the approved dosing in extensive-stage small cell lung cancer and once approved, would be available to patients with locally advanced, unresectable non-small cell lung cancer weighing more than 30 kilograms.

Newspaper round-up

More than half of furloughed jobs in the UK are at the highest risk of automation as the Covid crisis accelerates workplace technology change, driving up redundancies and inequality across the country, according to a report. The two-year commission on workers and technology, chaired by the Labour MP Yvette Cooper, found that workers in sectors hit hardest by the pandemic – such as hospitality, leisure and retail – face a “double whammy” as their jobs are at the most risk of being replaced by machines. - Guardian

Unilever, the consumer goods company, has announced plans to let shareholders vote on its climate transition plans, in a first for the UK’s blue-chip companies. The maker of consumer goods ranging from Dove soap to Hellmann’s mayonnaise will share its climate transition action plan with investors in the first quarter of 2021, before a vote at its annual meeting on 5 May. - Guardian

As much as £21bn of taxpayer-backed Covid lending is sitting unused in firms' bank accounts after businesses raced to shore up their finances when the pandemic hit. Borrowers are hoarding around half of the £42bn doled out under the Government's Bounce Back Loan scheme for small companies, according to senior executives from HSBC, Lloyds Bank and Natwest. - Telegraph

The board of broadband provider TalkTalk is on the brink of backing a £1.8bn take-private offer by a hedge fund tycoon nicknamed "the Rottweiler". Bosses at TalkTalk are poised to this week support a 97p-a-share swoop by Martin Hughes' firm Toscafund, their second largest shareholder, in a deal which would delist the company from the London Stock Exchange. - Telegraph

Airbnb and Doordash shares slipped further from last week’s debut day highs as Wall Street pushed back against the companies’ colossal valuations. In New York yesterday morning, Airbnb stock was down by as much as 24 per cent from its intraday peak on Thursday and Doordash was off by 22 per cent from its high on Wednesday. - The Times

US close

Wall Street stocks turned in a mixed performance on Monday as fears around additional restriction measures to curb the coronavirus spread offset optimism stemming from the rollout of a Covid-19 vaccine and some apparent progression in stimulus talks.

At the close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.62% at 29,861.55 and the S&P 500 was 0.44% weaker at 3,647.49, while the Nasdaq Composite saw out the session 0.50% stronger at 12,440.04.

The Dow Jones closed 184.82 points weaker on Monday, reversing gains recorded in the previous session after the Food and Drug Administration green-lit Pfizer and BioNTech's vaccine for use in the USA.

Following the FDA's emergency authorisation of the coronavirus vaccine, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also signed off on the drug, allowing inoculations to officially begin for Americans over the age of 16, with the first dose of the vaccine being administered in New York.

Also in focus, a bipartisan stimulus plan was rumoured to potentially be introduced as soon as Monday, according to Reuters, with $908.0bn to be split into a $748.0bn measure with money for jobless and small business and a further $160.0bn for controversial measures - including liability protections and state aid.