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The United Nations has announced the donation of a $6 million fund in support of the Maiduguri flood victims in Borno State.

The UN’s Humanitarian Coordinator in Nigeria, Mohammed Fall, disclosed this in a statement on Tuesday, September 17.

He said a joint mission comprising UN agencies and non-governmental organisations (NGOs), alongside the Nigeria Red Cross Society, visited the main city of Maiduguri over the weekend.

According to Fall, the team met with people who had been impacted, many of them had already displaced multiple times by conflict and insecurity in the area.

The flood was caused by an overflow in the Alau Dam located just over 10 miles to the south of Maiduguri.

“We and our partners are providing them with hot meals, we are facilitating air drops of food in hard-to-reach areas cut off by flood waters, and we are also trucking in water.

We are also providing water and sanitation hygiene services and water purification tablets to stem disease outbreaks.

This is in addition to supplying hygiene and dignity kits to women and girls, as well as emergency health and shelter services,” he said.

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Thanks to falling mortgage rates, homebuilders felt a bit less dismal about the housing market in September.The National Association of Home Builders' sentiment index rose to 41 in September from 39 in August, breaking a four-month streak of declines but remaining well below the 50 level that indicates most builders feel optimistic about the near-term outlook for the market.Falling mortgage rates over the last few months have helped boost the homebuilding outlook, though builders are still pessimistic about customers' ability to afford to buy houses.

According to Freddie Mac, the average rate offered for a 30-year fixed mortgage was 6.2%, down more than a percentage point since May. Rates have been pushed down by expectations in financial markets that the Federal Reserve is preparing to cut its influential fed funds rate this week.Despite the recent downtick, mortgage rates are still well above the rock-bottom lows they hit during the pandemic, and a lack of available homes for sale has kept prices hot for new and previously owned homes. Buyers with typical incomes struggle to afford the houses they want between high rates and high prices. On top of that, builders face rising construction costs, the association said.

Builders expect things to improve in the coming months as the Fed cuts rates. An index of builders’ expectations for future business rose to 53 from 49 in August, entering positive territory.“Thanks to lower interest rates, builders now have a positive view for future new home sales for the first time since May 2024,” NAHB Chairman Carl Harris said in a prepared statement. “However, the cost of construction remains elevated relative to household budgets, holding back some enthusiasm for current housing market conditions.”

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SolarEdge Technologies (SEDG) shares tumbled in early trading Tuesday, before rebounding later in the session after Jefferies downgraded the stock, pointing to tough competition in the solar power industry.

Jefferies analysts lowered their rating to "underperform" from "hold," and cut their price target to $17 from $23, implying close to 32% downside from Tuesday's intraday price of $22.37.

"Given significant headwinds in Europe from persistently high inventory levels and Chinese competition, as well as stiff competition in US, we see more downside to the stock,” the analysts said.

The analysts added they had hoped to gain more confidence in the solar power equipment maker during the RE+ clean energy event, but “unfortunately, that didn’t pan out.” Instead, they found “no near-term catalysts that have potential to significantly alter the trajectory.”

Along with dealing with a slowdown in demand, SolarEdge was also dealt a blow in June when it reported one of its customers filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy and wouldn’t be able to pay its multi-million dollar debt to the company. 

Despite slight gains Tuesday, SolarEdge shares have lost over three-quarters of their value since the start of the year.

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U.S. equities advanced around midday Tuesday following the news that retail sales rose more than expected in August, and as the Federal Reserve began a two-day meeting where it’s expected policymakers will begin cutting interest rates.

The Dow added to its all-time high set yesterday. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq also gained.

Intel (INTC) was the best-performing stock in the Dow after the semiconductor maker said it would turn its contract manufacturing business into a separate subsidiary, and struck a deal to make chips for Amazon’s (AMZN) Amazon Web Services. Amazon shares were up as well.

Shares of Microsoft (MSFT) rose as the software giant announced it was boosting its dividend by 10.7% and approved a $60 billion stock buyback. Dell Technologies (DELL) shares climbed as Mizuho initiated coverage with an "outperform" rating, pointing to tech firm’s strength in the soaring generative artificial intelligence (AI) product market.

Cigna Group (CI) shares fell. The insurer’s Express Scripts pharmacy-benefits unit sued the Federal Trade Commission over a recent report by regulators critical of pricing by benefit managers. Shares of Philip Morris International (PM) declined when the tobacco company sold its asthma inhaler maker Vectura Group to Molex Asia Holdings for $198 million. 

Oil futures were up. Gold prices dropped. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note was higher. The U.S. dollar increased versus the pound and yen. Most major cryptocurrencies traded in the green.

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The Federal Trade Commission's (FTC) legal challenge against the proposed $24.6 billion merger of Kroger (KR) and Albertsons (ACI) is set to end in an Oregon federal court Tuesday, with a judge to rule whether the regulator's antitrust argument is sufficient to halt the combination.

The FTC has argued that a merger between the country's two largest traditional supermarket chains could have anticompetitive impacts on prices and labor, impacting millions of Americans when prices have already risen substantially in recent years.

While the FTC has said the merger would reduce competition, the companies have responded by saying operating as a larger chain would allow them to better compete with the country's largest retailers like Walmart (WMT), Costco (COST), and Amazon (AMZN).

In its complaint, the FTC puts supermarkets like Kroger and Albertsons in a different category than the competition the companies cite. The regulator said the membership-only nature and bulk selection of a smaller range of products at Costco and Sam's Club, and the largely digital shopping experience of Amazon with a minimal retail footprint, put them in different categories for customers.

If the court agrees with the FTC, the agency's own definition of a supermarket could open the door for one of the companies it defined as not a supermarket like Amazon to potentially make acquisitions like the one the FTC is trying to block, a pair of antitrust lawyers told .

The regulator has also said the plan for the companies to sell hundreds of stores to another retailer to address competitive concerns isn't enough, saying the sale of a "hodgepodge" of stores and assets wouldn't "mitigate the substantial harm to consumers and workers" if they merged.

Kroger shares were little changed about 90 minutes after the opening bell Tuesday. Albertsons shares were down 1.6%.

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Oracle (ORCL) shares will likely remain in focus on Tuesday after jumping more than 5% to a new record high yesterday following recent bullish coverage from several investment firms.

Jefferies analysts lifted their price target on the stock to $190 from $170 over the weekend, while New York-based Melius Research on Monday upgraded the shares to a “buy” rating, with both firms impressed with the software giant's advancements and growth opportunities in the cloud computing market.

Oracle shares have gained 22% so far in September through Monday’s close, paving the way for their best month since October 2022. Investors cheered the company’s better-than-expected earnings report, which was announced last week alongside a new partnership with Amazon’s (AMZN) cloud computing unit as Oracle continues to expand its artificial intelligence (AI) footprint.

The stock was up 0.6% at $171.30 in recent premarket trading Tuesday.

Below, we’ll take a close look at the technicals on Oracle’s weekly chart and identify important price levels to watch out for.

After rallying to a new record high in mid-July, Oracle shares retraced to the top trendline of an ascending triangle before resuming their longer-term uptrend in early August. 

More recently, gains accelerated last week on the highest trading volume since mid-December, though the relative strength index (RSI) indicates overbought conditions, with a reading above the 70 threshold. Consequently, the stock may see short-term profit taking before potentially making another trending move higher.

During pullbacks, investors should monitor two key price levels.

The first sits at $145, an area on the chart where the shares may initially find support near last week's earnings breakout point and a series of comparable trading levels positioned around the July peak.

A deeper retracement could see the stock retest the $127 level, the same location where the price found buying interest last month near the ascending triangle’s top trendline. This region also finds added support from the upward sloping 50-day moving average.

To forecast a potential price target above the all-time high (ATH), we can use a bars pattern. To do this, we extract the stock’s trending move following a retest of a prior ascending triangle in late January 2021 and reposition it from the current pattern’s retest area. Such a technique projects an upside target of around $215.

It’s also worth pointing out the prior trending move occurred over 45 trading days, meaning that the stock’s current uptrend from last month’s low could play out until early June next year if price history rhymes.

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