PRE-MARKET | December 16, 2016 | $IOC, $XOM, $ADBE, $VZ, $YHOO, $HZNP, $MYL, $MRK, $GILD

1. CANF: $CANF Can Fite BioPharma phase II trial to treat NAFLD/NASH expected to commence in 2017 – Reuters

2. CANF:  $CANF Can Fite BioPharma phase II trial to treat NAFLD/NASH expected to commence in 2017 – Reuters

3. JBL:  $JBL Jabil Circuit’s Quarterly Results Largely Beat Targets – WSJ

4. HZNP:  $HZNP Horizon Pharma Surges Higher on Express Script Formulary News – SI

5. HZNP:  $HZNP Horizon Pharma Surges Higher on Express Script Formulary News – SI

6. IOC, XOM:  $IOC InterOil says raises cap on additional cash payment in Exxon $XOM deal – Reuters

7. IOC, XOM:  $IOC InterOil says raises cap on additional cash payment in Exxon $XOM deal – Reuters

8. MYL:  $MYL Mylan Launches First Generic EpiPen – SI

9. MYL:  $MYL Mylan Launches First Generic EpiPen – SI

10. AZN, IONS:  $IONS Ionis Earns $28 Million from AstraZeneca $AZN for a New Drug to Treat Cancer – PRN

11. AZN, IONS:  $IONS Ionis Earns $28 Million from AstraZeneca $AZN for a New Drug to Treat Cancer – PRN

12. ADBE:  $ADBE Adobe Posts Strong Earnings; Strong Dollar Affects Outlook – 24/7Wallst

13. NVS:  $NVS Novartis says buys Ziarco Group to expand skin care portfolio – Reuters

14. NVS:  $NVS Novartis says buys Ziarco Group to expand skin care portfolio – Reuters

15. VZ, YHOO:  $VZ Verizon Said to Weigh More Media, Ad Deals Amid Yahoo $YHOO Turmoil – BBG

16. VZ, YHOO:  $VZ Verizon Said to Weigh More Media, Ad Deals Amid Yahoo $YHOO Turmoil – BBG

17. MRK:  $MRK Merck Wins Record $2.5 Billion Patent Verdict Against Gilead

18. GILD, MRK:  $MRK Merck Wins Record $2.5 Billion Patent Verdict Against Gilead $GILD – BBG

19. KR: $KR Kroger Seeks to Cut Costs With Voluntary Retirement Plan – WSJ

20. PCLN: $PCLN Priceline Names Chief Strategist Fogel CEO – Barron’s

21. KR: $KR Kroger Seeks to Cut Costs With Voluntary Retirement Plan – WSJ

22. OMC: $OMC Omnicom Group Subpoenaed By Justice Department in Ad Probe – WSJ

23. OMC:  $OMC Omnicom Group Subpoenaed By Justice Department in Ad Probe – WSJ

24. GILD:  $GILD Merck Wins Record $2.5 Billion Patent Verdict Against Gilead

25. GILD:  $GILD Merck Wins Record $2.5 Billion Patent Verdict Against Gilead

26. SNY:  $SNY Actelion’s shares jump on report of Sanofi deal nearing

27. SNY:  $SNY Actelion’s shares jump on report of Sanofi deal nearing – Reuters

28. HON:  $HON Honeywell forecasts 2017 earnings largely below expectations – reuters

29. ORCL:  $ORCL Oracle Slips: FYQ2 EPS Beats; Q3 Revenue View Beats – Barron’s

30. GPOR:  $GPOR Gulfport Energy 29M Share Offering Prices at $21.50 – SI

31. FNSR:  $FNSR Finisar Corp. Is Down After Offering Announcement – RTT

32. AGIO:  $AGIO Agios Shelves Rare Anemia Disorder Drug Due to Liver Toxicity, Switches to Backup – TheStreet

33. AGIO:  $AGIO Agios Shelves Rare Anemia Disorder Drug Due to Liver Toxicity, Switches to Backup – TheStreet

1. BCRX:JMP Securities Upgrades BioCryst Pharma $BCRX to Market Outperform

2. BID:UPDATE: Cowen Upgrades Sotheby’s $BID to Outperform

3. CLX, MS:Clorox was Upgraded to a Hold Rating at Morgan Stanley $CLX $MS

4. CRL:Goldman Sachs Upgrades Charles River Labs $CRL to Neutral

5. HZNP:$hznp w/ lots of positive notes & upgrade: Mizuho ups to buy $25 PT Stifel reiterates $35 PT Jefferies reiterates buy & $25 PT

6. OXY:Goldman Sachs Upgrades Occidental Petroleum $OXY to Neutral

7. PES:Goldman Sachs Upgrades Pioneer Energy Services Corp $PES to Buy

8. REGN:$REGN upgraded to Buy from Neutral at BTIG. PT $460

9. RICE:Goldman Sachs Upgrades Rice Energy $RICE to Buy

10. RPAI:JPMorgan Upgrades Retail Properties of America $RPAI to Neutral

11. VER:JPMorgan Upgrades VEREIT $VER to Overweight

12. WES:CapitalOne Upgrades Western Gas Partners $WES to Overweight

1. APA:Wells Fargo Downgrades Apache Corp. $APA to Market Perform

2. DCT:JPMorgan Downgrades DCT Industrial Trust Inc. $DCT to Neutral

3. DO:RBC Capital Downgrades Diamond Offshore $DO to Underperform

4. DUK:JPMorgan Downgrades Duke Energy $DUK to Underweight

5. EPR:JPMorgan Downgrades Entertainment Properties Trust $EPR to Neutral

6. FDC:Goldman Sachs Downgrades First Data Corporation $FDC to Neutral

7. HP:RBC Capital Downgrades Helmerich & Payne $HP to Sector Perform

8. JWN:JPMorgan Downgrades Nordstrom $JWN to Underweight

9. MPW:JPMorgan Downgrades Medical Properties Trust $MPW to Underweight

10. MRT:JPMorgan Downgrades MedEquities Realty Trust $MRT to Underweight

11. NFX:Wells Fargo Downgrades Newfield Exploration $NFX to Market Perform

12. OKSB:DA Davidson Downgrades Southwest Bancorp $OKSB to Neutral

13. PTEN:Goldman Sachs Downgrades Patterson-UTI Energy $PTEN to Neutral

14. QDEL:Piper Jaffray Downgrades Quidel Corp. $QDEL to Neutral

15. SGMS:Macquarie Downgrades Scientific Games $SGMS to Neutral

16. WERN:Stifel Nicolaus Downgrades Werner Enterprises to Hold $WERN

1. DRYS:$DRYS back over $6 in pre-market on heavy volume 👆

2. MRK:EMA CHMP December meeting highlights Positive opinions: $RHHBY alectinib $MRK bezlotoxumab $LLY $INCY baricitinib

3. OPHT:$OPHT halted news pending

4. ORCL:Sunnier outlook from the cloud for Adobe than Oracle. $ADBE up 2% #premarket following earnings. But $ORCL down 2.5% after its results.

5. IONS:$IONS AstraZeneca Exercises Option to License IONIS-KRAS-2.5 Rx $AZN.

6. XBIT:$XBIT — No CHMP opinion on Xilonix. Uh oh..

7. AGIO:$AGIO PT lowered to $45 from $56 at Leerink

8. VCEL:$VCEL 6.2m shares at $2.75, hearing from Fly

1. European Medicines Agency – News and Events – Meeting highlights from the Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) 12-15 December 2016

2. This Is Why Verizon Wants to Buy Digital Media Companies

3. Jabil Circuit’s Quarterly Results Largely Beat Targets

4. Valeant’s 2016 Has Been All Pain, No Gain Amid Record Stock Drop

5. Jabil comments point to iPhone weakness now, strength later, says UBS

1. Translation: A group of incredibly biased left-wing fake news outlets will bury dissenting opinions.

The decision comes after Facebook received heated criticism for its role in spreading a deluge of political misinformation during the US presidential election like one story that falsely said the Pope had endorsed Donald Trump.

We are only involved to the extent that Facebook relies on the list of signatories to our code of principles as a starting point for the organizations it chooses to verify a Poynter representative told Business Insider.

But after facing significant backlash for its denial to stories on its network Zuckerberg now calls Facebook a new kind of platform with a responsibility to build a space where people can be informed.

2. The Associated Press announces its war on its competition.

The answer as always is war gentlemen at a time of our choosing.

With the Deutsche Bank chat logs showing a collusive network across banks it would seem unlikely that the defendants will be able to refute the antitrust claim by the plaintiffs.

3. Thrilled to announce that we will produce and test autonomous vehicles in Michigan. This is the future of mobility!

The auto industry is changing more today than it has in the past years and nothing says this more clearly than the growing push to develop and introduce autonomous vehicles AVs.

At GM we dramatically accelerated our own AV development efforts this past spring when we acquired Silicon Valley startup Cruise Automation.

By adding Michigan to our testing program ensuring that our AVs can operate safely across a wide range of road weather and climate conditions from desert heat to Great Lakes snow to crowded city streets.

4. Trust is at the heart of our service. That means we need to be transparent and admit our missteps.

That means we need to be transparent admit our missteps and commit to making the Evernote experience the best it can be from the way the app functions across platforms to the way we communicate with the people who use This was the message from Evernote CEO Chris today.

As a result we will not implement the previously announced Privacy Policy changes that were scheduled to go into effect January.

Instead in the coming months we will be revising our existing Privacy Policy to address our concerns reinforce that their data remains private by default and confirm the trust they have placed in Evernote is well founded.

5. .@Facebook will use leftists to help censor news?

The decision comes after Facebook received heated criticism for its role in spreading a deluge of political misinformation during the US presidential election like one story that falsely said the Pope had endorsed Donald Trump.

We are only involved to the extent that Facebook relies on the list of signatories to our code of principles as a starting point for the organizations it chooses to verify a Poynter representative told Business Insider.

But after facing significant backlash for its denial to stories on its network Zuckerberg now calls Facebook a new kind of platform with a responsibility to build a space where people can be informed.

6. The latest Xbox One update could further widen the gap between Xbox Live and PlayStation Network download speeds.

Released yesterday the update should make downloads faster for all Xbox One owners.

Anecdotally Xbox Live has long offered download speeds that are higher than those on the PlayStation Network.

An independent study earlier this year found that network is faster and more reliable than although that report focused on comparing factors like lag and matchmaking rather than download speeds.

7. Very excited to announce that @AP will partner with @Facebook to help identify and debunk fake news!

Now when AP or another participating organization flags a piece of content as fake Facebook users will see that it has been disputed and there will be a link to the corresponding article explaining why.

AP has consistently provided nonpartisan fact checks to its member news organizations and customers which objectively examine the claims of politicians and government and other officials.

A fake news story prompted a man to fire a rifle inside the popular pizza place as he attempted to a conspiracy theory that Hillary Clinton was running a child sex ring from there police said.

8. Elon Musk is expected to urge Trump not to abandon the Paris climate agreement.

Still probably in favor to work with the incoming administration especially as it starts to shape new policies that are dear to heart like regulations to bring cars to roadways and whether to abide by the Paris climate agreement or pull out a threat Trump made on the campaign trail.

That sit well with Musk who will likely urge the Trump administration to remain a signatory on the international climate accord.

Rex Tillerson pick for secretary of state and CEO of Exxon Mobil also supported participation in the climate talks and endorsed the idea of a national carbon tax.

9. Conservatives react with skepticism and alarm to Facebook’s war on “fake news”

Conservatives reacted with alarm to Facebook announcement that it will partner with to combat fake news expressing extreme skepticism the would be applied equally to both sides of the political spectrum.

Charles Cooke editor of National Review Online the premier conservative news outlet for decades told Business Insider in an email that he agreed with everything RBPundit said.

Mark Hemingway a senior writer at the Weekly Standard a conservative magazine reacted with three blunt words when he saw Facebook announcement OH HELL NO.

10. The Facebook flag says “disputed by 3rd Party Fact-Checkers.”

We use the reports from our community along with other signals to send stories to these organizations Facebook VP Adam Mosseri said in a blog post Thursday.

Facebook and other social media companies are under pressure from users and journalism advocacy groups to combat the proliferation of fake news.

At a recent journalism industry conference Facebook representatives said that addressing the spread of knowingly fake stories is the priority at the highest levels of the company.