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*Stock data as of market close. Here's what these numbers mean. | - Stocks: The software scare has spread to the rest of the market, pushing the S&P 500 into negative territory in 2026 as investors watch AI go from hero to villain.
- Commodities: Natural gas stockpiles were hit with their largest drawdown ever last week while the US endured a barrage of winter weather. Oil lost some of its mojo after the US and Iran announced that nuclear deal talks will take place tomorrow.
- Jobs: A barrage of bad jobs reports hit markets today, including:
- Layoffs in January rose 118% year over year, making it the worst January for job cuts since 2009.
- Job openings declined in December for a third straight month, hitting their lowest level since September 2020.
- Initial jobless claims rose to their highest level in nearly two months last week, though closures due to winter storms likely played a role.
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GLP-1 Hims & Hers Health has a simple mantra: fake it ’til you make it. Today, the telemedicine company began offering a copycat version of Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy pill, priced at only $49—about $100 cheaper than Novo’s version. The move instantly triggered backlash from Novo Nordisk, which accused the company of “illegal compounding” and vowed legal action against Hims & Hers. The shots fired today are only the latest in the ongoing war between telehealth startups offering compounded GLP-1s and big pharma companies Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly, which hold the original patents for the blue-chip weight loss drugs. “This is another example of Hims & Hers’ historic behavior of duping the American public with knock-off GLP-1 products, and the FDA has previously warned them about their deceptive advertising of GLP-1 knock-offs,” Novo said in a statement today. But the (many) legal threats over the years and a subsequent seesawing stock price haven’t stopped Hims & Hers from continuing to poke the big pharma bear. While Eli Lilly doesn’t have an oral GLP-1 pill on the market quite yet, it is expected to release its own, orforglipron, this year. Novo Nordisk dropped 8.16% and Eli Lilly shed 7.88% today after Hims & Hers announced the cheap pill. Hims & Hers rose at the open, but fell after Novo threatened to retaliate, ending the day down 3.77%. Novo’s woes The Hims & Hers pill fiasco comes at an already trying time for the Danish drugmaking giant. Back when Ozempic was first approved in 2017, Novo hit the GLP-1 jackpot, propelling its stock to new heights while its market cap surpassed the entire Danish economy. But after a slew of supply chain bungles, the company blew its early lead. Now, it's not only facing competition from its arch rival in the weight loss drug market, Eli Lilly, but also the slew of telemedicine competitors it's been playing whack-a-mole trying to stop. Over the past year, Novo’s stock has sunk 49.45%. Meanwhile, its business as a whole is ailing: Earlier this week, Novo said that it expects both its sales and its operating profit to dip between 5% and 13% for the full year, partially because of a sales decline in the US. That news drove Novo shares to their lowest since July 2021 a few days ago. Eli Lilly, on the other hand, isn’t letting the tough competition hold it back, telling investors that it expects roughly 25% sales growth for the full year when it reported earnings yesterday. Looks like Novo’s the biggest loser once again.—LB | | |
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Presented By iShares by BlackRock |
STOCKS 🟢 What’s up - Pandora rose 16.50% after the world’s largest jeweler said it will cut reliance on silver, easing exposure to volatile input costs.
- Healthcare company McKesson climbed 16.52% as fiscal Q3 EPS beat the Street’s highest estimate.
- Semiconductor and software company Arm Holdings gained 5.70% on strong Q3 results, with revenue up 26% year over year.
- Cardinal Health advanced 9.83% after beating earnings, with bottom-line growth up 36.3% from last year.
- Hershey rose 9.03% as Q4 earnings and revenue topped expectations.
 What’s down
- Alphabet fell 0.60% despite beating estimates after warning that AI spending will ramp up sharply in 2026.
- Shell dropped 5.28% after missing expectations and posting its weakest quarterly profit in nearly five years.
- Peloton slid 25.72% as it missed top and bottom lines and fell short of internal sales targets in the holiday quarter.
- Gemini Space Station sank 8.72% after announcing plans to cut 25% of its workforce while winding down overseas operations.
- Qualcomm declined 8.46% following soft guidance tied to the ongoing memory-chip shortage.
- Glencore fell 6.96% after merger talks with Rio Tinto collapsed, dashing hopes for a $200 billion mining giant.
- Estée Lauder slipped 19.19% as restructuring charges and tariffs weighed on the bottom line.
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CALL OF THE DAY Insider trading is a no-no—but trading on insiders? Now you’ve got an investment strategy. When someone working for a publicly traded company purchases or sells shares of that company, it must be disclosed with the SEC in what’s known as a Form 4 filing. Those transactions can provide useful information for investors who want to know more about how insiders feel regarding a company’s prospects—particularly purchases, which might indicate that an insider thinks the company is undervalued (insiders often sell shares for compensation purposes, rather than pure pessimism). Seems simple enough, but an analysis from the Wall Street Journal today found that it’s not so easy. They took a look at 1,400 insider purchases at S&P 500 companies over the past five years, and found that 69% of those purchases were made when the company’s stock price was falling. Those votes of confidence that the company would soon turn things around were rewarded with a median 2% share-price pop in the month after a purchase was made. That’s not too shabby, but the problem was that the comeback only lasted about 90 days before a recovery rally trailed off. Plus, only 15% of stocks purchased by insiders ever climbed back from where they’d fallen in the 30 days prior. That short recovery window plus the small selection of winners makes it tough for investors trying to tail insider purchases. That said, there are ways to juice your returns: for example, research shows that insider purchases made when a stock hits its 52-week low tend to outperform. Just do your own research before blindly following the crowd, even if they’ve got the inside track.—MR |
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CRYPTOCURRENCY As snow piles up outside, the crypto winter is setting in. Bitcoin has dropped nearly 50% from its October peak, slipping below $70,000 early this morning—a level it hasn’t traded at since November 2024, completely erasing its gains since President Trump’s election. It fell all the way to $64,490 today, and has dropped 18% this week alone. For years, crypto advocates pitched bitcoin as a modern safe haven: decentralized, detached from central banks, and a hedge against inflation, often grouped alongside gold. That thesis is breaking down: instead of tracking gold higher amid geopolitical uncertainty and policy volatility, bitcoin has diverged sharply, behaving more like a risk asset. Gold has surged 10.57% in 2026, while so far this year bitcoin is down 27.19%, ether has fallen 36.48%, and solana has dropped 35.79%. What’s behind bitcoin’s slide? 1. Liquidity and capital flows US spot-bitcoin ETFs enjoyed huge capital inflows that supported prices through 2025—but now they’re seeing outflows, with institutions turning into net sellers in 2026. The reversal has triggered forced deleveraging: more than $2 billion has been pulled out of bitcoin ETFs this week alone, according to Bloomberg, and over $5 billion has exited the market over the past three months. 2. Fed uncertainty The prospect of Kevin Warsh taking the helm at the Federal Reserve rattled crypto markets, accelerating the unwind of leveraged bullish positions. While Warsh has signaled support for lower rates, his long-standing focus on shrinking the Fed’s balance sheet has raised concerns about tighter system liquidity, a backdrop that typically pressures speculative assets like bitcoin. 3. Weak retail demand Bitcoin is losing mindshare as retail traders chase other opportunities, from sports betting and prediction markets to zero-day equity options and higher-yield crypto trades on decentralized platforms. With more ways to speculate, bitcoin is no longer the default outlet for retail risk-taking. What’s next? The $70,000 level was a critical line of support in the sand, and a sustained break below it could lower the floor to between $60,000 and $65,000, James Butterfill, head of research at Coinshares, told CNBC. Until liquidity improves and risk appetite stabilizes, bitcoin is likely to remain vulnerable to further selloffs. But one true believer is sticking with it: earlier today, Michael Saylor, CEO of Strategy, tweeted crypto’s familiar four-letter creed: HODL. It remains to be seen if anyone actually listens to him.—SY | | |
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Together With iShares by BlackRock |
CALENDAR Economic announcements: The labor market bonanza takes a brief break now that the monthly US jobs report has been postponed until next Wednesday, though we’ll still get a preliminary reading of consumer sentiment for February and a look at consumer credit for December tomorrow. Earnings reports: Toyota, Under Armour, Philip Morris International, Société Générale, Ørsted, Centene, and AutoNation Everything else: The opening ceremony for the Winter Olympics kicks off in the host cities of Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy |
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✢ A Note From iShares by BlackRock Visit www.iShares.com to view a prospectus, which includes investment objectives, risks, fees, expenses and other information that you should read and consider carefully before investing. Risks include principal loss. When the Fund sells call options on a large cap equity index, it receives a premium but it takes on the risk that these options may reduce any profit from increases in the market value of the long equity positions held by the Fund. Any such reduction in profits would be the difference between the payoff of the call option and the premium received. The Fund would also retain the risk of loss if the long equity positions decline in value. The premiums received from the options may not be sufficient to offset any losses sustained from the long equity positions. Factors that may influence the value of the options generally include the underlying asset’s price, interest rates, dividends, the actual and implied volatility levels of the underlying asset’s price, and the remaining time until the options expire, among others. The value of the options written by the Fund typically do not increase or decrease at the same rate as the underlying asset’s price on a day-to-day basis due to these factors. The Fund is actively managed and does not seek to replicate the performance of a specified index, may have higher portfolio turnover, and may charge higher fees than index funds due to increased trading and research expenses. There is no guarantee the fund will meet its investment objective. The Fund’s use of derivatives may reduce the Fund’s returns and/or increase volatility and subject the Fund to counterparty risk, which is the risk that the other party in the transaction will not fulfill its contractual obligation. The Fund could suffer losses related to its derivative positions because of a possible lack of liquidity in the secondary market and as a result of unanticipated market movements, which losses are potentially unlimited. There can be no assurance that the Fund’s hedging transactions will be effective. The iShares Funds are distributed by BlackRock Investments, LLC (together with its affiliates, “BlackRock”). BlackRock is not affiliated with Morning Brew. ©2026 BlackRock, Inc. or its affiliates. All rights reserved. iSHARES, BLACKROCK, and THE MARKET IS YOURS are trademarks of BlackRock, Inc. or its affiliates. All other trademarks are those of their respective owners. [MKTG0226-5149989-EXP0227] |
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