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The Dow plummeted more than 375 points Wednesday morning. Airline stocks were in the red after American Airlines showed a weak guidance report on Tuesday.
American Airlines said it is slashing its second-quarter profit outlook and that its Chief Commercial Officer, Vasu Raja, will step down in June, prompting shares of the carrier to plummet by more than 14% after the market opened on Wednesday. The company said it is expecting its unit revenue to be down between 5% and 6% compared to a year ago. It had previously forecasted that revenue would decline between 1% and 3%.
American also updated its adjusted earnings per share estimate and said it expects that metric to be between $1.00 and $1.15 during the period, down from its previous range of $1.15 and $1.45 earnings per share.
Pressure mounted on other airline stocks as well, plunging Southwest Airlines, United Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Spirit Airlines, and JetBlue Airways by 4.4%, 2.2%, 2.5, 3.6%, and 6%, respectively.
Meanwhile, after four consecutive days of climbing, AI stock Nvidia fell 0.8% after experiencing early positive movement Wednesday morning. The AI chipmaker’s market capitalization is close to overtaking that of Apple.
In morning trading, the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 377 points, or about 1%, to 38,475. The Nasdaq lost 0.5%, while the S&P 500 shed 0.7%.
ConocoPhillips is buying Marathon Oil, stock goes up
ConocoPhillips will buy Marathon Oil in an all-stock transaction valued at $22.5 billion, including $5.4 billion of net debt, the companies announced Wednesday. The deal will be “immediately accretive” to ConocoPhillips’ earnings, cash from operations, free cash flow and capital returns to shareholders. After the news, Marathon Oil’s stock price increased by over 9% in the morning.
The acquisition will bolster ConocoPhillips’ onshore portfolio, adding over 2 billion barrels of resources, the company said. The transaction is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2024, pending stockholder and regulatory approval.
ConocoPhillips was the second-largest producer of crude oil and natural gas liquids in the U.S. as of the third quarter of last year. Houston-based Marathon’s exploration and production efforts are focused in resource-rich areas across the country, including the Eagle Ford in Texas, Permian in New Mexico, STACK and SCOOP in Oklahoma, and the Bakken in North Dakota.
–Francisco Velasquez and Rocio Fabbro contributed to this article.