Midday movers: Small cap stocks rule, Archer-Daniels-Midland falls, and more

(Updated - January 22, 2024 11:28 AM EST)

Investing.com -- Main U.S. indexes edged higher Monday, at the start of a week that sees the earnings season ramp up as well as the release of some key economic numbers. The Russel 2000 index significantly outperformed the Dow, S&P 500, and Nasdaq.

Here are some of the biggest U.S. stock movers today:​

Macy’s (M) stock rose 2% after the department store chain rejected a $5.8 billion take private bid from investing firm Arkhouse and hedge fund Brigade.

Boeing (NYSE:BA) stock fell 0.5% after the Federal Aviation Administration's recommendation for door plug inspections on the Boeing 737-900ER model.

Spirit Airlines (NYSE:SAVE) stock rose 11% after the budget carrier and JetBlue Airways (NASDAQ:JBLU), up 2%, announced that they had appealed a federal court decision blocking their proposed merger on antitrust concerns.

Archer-Daniels-Midland (ADM) stock fell 20% after the food processing company said its chief financial officer has been placed under administrative leave amid an investigation into accounting practices in its nutrition segment.

SolarEdge (NASDAQ:SEDG) stock rose 4% after the renewable energy firm announced plans to lay off about 16% of its global workforce.

ExxonMobil (NYSE:XOM) stock fell 1% after the oil giant filed a lawsuit against U.S. and Dutch activist investors in a bid to stop them from submitting climate proposals during the oil giant’s annual shareholder meeting.

American Airlines (NASDAQ:AAL) stock rose 1% after Wolfe Research upgraded the carrier to ‘outperform’ from ‘peer perform’, citing the potential for Revenue per Available Seat Mile to rise later this year as capacity growth slows.

NuStar Energy (NS) stock rose over 14% and Sunoco (SUN) fell 5% after the two companies agreed to combine in an all-stock deal valued at about $7.3 billion, including debt.

AMD (NASDAQ:AMD) declined 4.75% after the high flying chip stock's rating was cut to ‘market perform’ from ‘outperform’ by Northland Capital. Analysts tied the downgrade to valuation and said they think AI will be big but not as big as investors are thinking.

Gilead Sciences (NASDAQ:GILD) declined 10% after its EVOKE-01 trial of Trodelvy in lung cancer failed to significantly improve survival.

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) stock rose 3.5% after Morgan Stanley said it was its top pick in semiconductors, replacing Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA).

Palantir Technologies Inc . (NYSE:PLTR) stock climbed 6% as sentiment improved for high growth technology stocks. Affirm Holdings (NASDAQ:AFRM) shares were higher by 7%, Snowflake (NYSE:SNOW) gained 4%, and ARK Innovation ETF (ARKK) was higher by 2.4%.

Cloudflare Inc . (NYSE:NET), another technology stock, climbed 5% after its price target was raised to $82 at Citi. The bank also raised its price target on Datadog (NASDAQ:DDOG) to $150, sending the stock higher by 2.7%.

Additional reporting by Louis Juricic