These Stocks Moved the Most Today: Electronic Arts, Nvidia, Intel, Carnival, Western Digital, Occidental, Robinhood, and More

Traders working at the New York Stock Exchange. (NYSE)

Key Points

• Electronic Arts is being acquired by an investor consortium in an all-cash, take-private deal that values EA at about $55 billion.
• Occidental Petroleum rises following a report that it’s in talks to sell its OxyChem division for $10 billion.
• Nvidia begins week with solid gains while Intel tumbles after rising 20% last week.

Stocks ended higher on Monday, gold prices rose, and the dollar slipped as a possible U.S. government shutdown loomed over Wall Street.

These stocks moved Monday:

Electronic Arts rose 4.5% to $202.05. The videogame maker said it was being acquired by an investor consortium in an all-cash, take-private deal that values EA at about $55 billion. The group of investors includes Silver Lake, Affinity Partners, and the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia, the country’s sovereign-wealth fund. EA shareholders will receive $210 a share in cash, which represents a 25% premium to the closing price Thursday of $168.32.

Occidental Petroleum rose 1.3% after a report said the oil company was in talks to sell its OxyChem division for $10 billion to an unknown buyer, creating one of the world’s largest stand-alone petrochemical companies. Occidental’s divestment could be announced in the coming two weeks, the Financial Times reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

Nvidia was up 2.1%. Shares of the chip maker closed up 0.3% on Friday. Nvidia recently signed deals with OpenAI, Alibaba, and Microsoft. The stock has gained nearly 36% this year amid ever-increasing demand for Nvidia’s artificial-intelligence semiconductors.

Intel fell 2.9%. The stock ended Friday’s session up 4.4% and gained 20% over the past week, making it the best weekly performer in the S&P 500. Lifting shares of the chip maker was a Bloomberg report that Intel had approached Apple asking for an investment, and a report from The Wall Street Journal that Intel had approached Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing as well.

Data-storage company Western Digital climbed 9.2% to $116.74. Just weeks after naming Western Digital a “top pick,” Morgan Stanley reiterated an Overweight rating on the stock and nearly doubled its price target to $171 from $99—the highest figure on Wall Street, according to FactSet. The market hasn’t fully priced in the uptick in demand for the company’s core products, Morgan Stanley argued.

Robinhood Markets surged 12.3% to a record closing high. CEO Vlad Tenev said Friday the company was rolling out its Robinhood Banking service “to the first set of external customers.” Shares have surged nearly 258% this year.

Lam Research gained 2.2% to $131.09 after Deutsche Bank upgraded the stock to Buy from Hold and raised its price target to $150 from $100. Deutsche Bank said the chip-equipment maker’s exposure to memory and leading-edge logic chips give it a solid platform for growth.

Merus soared 36% to $93.67 after larger biotech peer Genmab said it planned to buy the Dutch drugmaker for $8 billion, or $97 a share, in cash. Merus’ pipeline includes a promising head and neck cancer drug and is “a compelling strategic fit” to Genmab’s antibody therapies and oncology portfolio, Genmab said. The deal is expected to close by the first quarter of 2026. Genmab’s American depositary receipts fell slightly.

Shares of electric-vehicle maker Tesla rose 0.6% after gaining 4% on Friday. The company is expected to issue third-quarter deliveries this week, with Wall Street projecting about 447,000, down about 3% from a year earlier.

Shares of MoonLake Immunotherapeutics sank 90% after the biotechnology company reported disappointing trial results for an antibody-based therapy. In one of two identical trials, MoonLake’s sonelokimab drug didn’t have a statistically significant effect in treating the skin condition hidradenitis suppurativa, or HS, the company said. The company pinned the result on a “higher-than-expected placebo response rate.” The results were released Sunday.

Carnival tumbled 4%, even as fiscal third-quarter earnings from the cruise company topped analysts’ estimates and fourth-quarter guidance also beat forecasts. Carnival also hiked its fiscal-year earnings guidance to $2.14 a share, up from $1.97.

Earnings reports were expected Monday after the closing bell from Jefferies Financial, Progress Software, and Vail Resorts.

Earnings are expected later in the week from Nike, Paychex, Lamb Weston, United Natural Foods, RPM International, Acuity, Conagra Brands, and Cal-Maine Foods.

Write to Joe Woelfel at joseph.woelfel@barrons.com and Mackenzie Tatananni at mackenzie.tatananni@barrons.com