Stocks making the biggest moves midday: Best Buy, Altice, Occidental, Moderna and more

Check out the companies making headlines in midday trading.

Energy stocks – Energy stocks led the S&P 500 on Monday as oil prices climbed amid supply concerns driven by a pick-up in demand as pandemic conditions around the world start to ease. Cimarex and Cabot climbed over 8%, Diamondback and Occidental added more than 7%, Marathon Oil rose 6% and Halliburton wasn’t far behind with more than 5% gains.

Financial stocks – Shares of financial institutions also rallied as the yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note climbed above 1.5% at one point Monday morning. M&T Bank and Lincoln rose 5.5% and and nearly 5%, while MetLife and State Street added more than 3%. Bank stocks tend to benefit from rising interest rates because they allow for higher margins and profits.

Best Buy – Shares of Best Buy jumped 5% after Piper Sandler raised its price target on the stock to $150 from $146 per share. The new projection implies 43.2% upside from Best Buy’s closing price Friday. Piper Sandler called Best Buy “one of our top ideas under coverage” and said Best Buy’s new membership program is “one of the most intriguing initiatives BBY has launched in 5+ years.”

Altice – Shares of the broadband and video company dropped more than 3% after Credit Suisse downgraded the stock to neutral from outperform. The Wall Street firm said Altice could experience a short-term negative impact from its aggressive fiber buildout strategy.

Carnival Corp. – Shares of the cruise line operator jumped 4.7% after the company issued an upbeat business update on Friday. Carnival said its “voyages are already cash flow positive” and it expects the positive trend to continue. The company reported a U.S. GAAP net loss of $2.8 billion and an adjusted net loss of $2.0 billion for the third quarter of 2021.

Vaccine makers – Makers of Covid-19 vaccines fell as Singapore reported a daily record in Covid cases and hit five new daily highs in the past week. The two main vaccines used in Singapore are those developed by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna. Pfizer is roughly flat Monday but BioNTech dropped almost 8%, Novavax also dropped about 7% and Moderna fell nearly 5%. CureVac lost over 3%.

Acceleron Pharma – Acceleron shares jumped more than 6% after Bloomberg reported on Friday that the company is in talks to be acquired by an unnamed large pharmaceutical company for about $180 per share. Bristol-Myers Squibb, which already owns an 11.5% stake in Acceleron, is reportedly one of the potential candidates being considered.

— CNBC’s Hannah Miao, Maggie Fitzgerald and Yun Li contributed reporting