An Old Lindsey Graham Tweet About Trump Comes Back To Haunt Them Both

An old tweet by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) about President Donald Trump is resurfacing in light of Tuesday night’s election results in Georgia. 

Graham has been a staunch Trump ally in recent years, but that wasn’t the case during the campaign for the 2016 Republican nomination when he tweeted: 

When Trump entered the White House, the Republican Party controlled the presidency and both houses of Congress. Democrats gained control over the House in an anti-Trump wave during the 2018 midterms and Trump lost his reelection bid in November. 

Now, the Republicans are on the brink of losing control over the Senate as well after Democrat Raphael Warnock defeated Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R) for one seat and Jon Ossoff (D) pulled ahead of Sen. David Perdue (R) for the other. 

That caused Graham’s old prediction of the party’s doom to resurface late Tuesday:

U.S. Pending Home Sales Drop For Third Straight Month In November

Reflecting a shortage of inventory and fast-rising home prices, the National Association of Realtors released a report on Wednesday showing a continued decrease in U.S. pending home sales in the month of November.

NAR said its pending home sales index slid 2.6 percent to 125.7 in November after falling by 0.9 percent to 129.1 in October. Economists had expected pending home sales to come in unchanged.

Pending home sales declined for the third straight month but were still up by 16.4 percent compared to the same month a year ago.

A pending home sale is one in which a contract was signed but not yet closed. Normally, it takes four to six weeks to close a contracted sale.

“It is important to keep in mind that the current sales and prices are far stronger than a year ago,” said NAR chief economist Lawrence Yun.

He added, “The market is incredibly swift this winter with the listed homes going under contract on average at less than a month due to a backlog of buyers wanting to take advantage of record-low mortgage rates.”

Yun offered a favorable outlook for the housing market in 2021, forecasting a 10 percent jump in existing home sales and a 20 percent spike in new home sales.

The continued pullback in pending home sales in November reflected decreases in all four regions of the country, with pending sales in the West plunging by 4.7 percent.

Pending home sales in the Northeast and Midwest also tumbled by 3.3 percent and 3.1 percent, respectively, while pending sales in the South fell by 1.1 percent.

Change Healthcare To Combine With OptumInsight – Quick Facts

Optum, part of UnitedHealth Group (UNH), and Change Healthcare (CHNG) have agreed to combine. Change Healthcare will join with OptumInsight. The agreement calls for the acquisition of Change Healthcare’s common stock for $25.75 per share. The acquisition is anticipated to be accretive to UnitedHealth Group’s net and adjusted earnings per share by approximately $0.20 and $0.50 respectively in 2022, advancing strongly in subsequent years.

“Together we will help streamline and inform the vital clinical, administrative and payment processes on which health care providers and payers depend to serve patients,” said Andrew Witty, President of UnitedHealth Group and CEO of Optum.

TEGNA Reports Preliminary Q4 Results; Renews Share Repurchase Program

TEGNA Inc. (TGNA) reported preliminary financial results for the fourth quarter. The company expects to record adjusted EBITDA to be in the range of $424-$429 million, an increase of 85 to 88 percent year-on-year. Revenue is projected to be in the range of $932-$937 million, up 34 to 35 percent.

TEGNA Board has authorized the renewal of its share repurchase program which allows the company to repurchase up to $300 million of its issued and outstanding common stock
over the next three years.

AmerisourceBergen Raises FY21 Adj. Earnings Guidance – Quick Facts

AmerisourceBergen (ABC) said it now expects fiscal 2021 adjusted earnings per share to be in the range of $8.25 to $8.50, up from the previous range of $8.20 to $8.45. The company updated fiscal 2021 guidance to reflect its continued strong operating income performance. The company noted that the updated financial guidance does not include any contribution from the proposed Alliance Healthcare acquisition or any incremental growth from the expanded U.S. partnership.

AmerisourceBergen said all other previously communicated aspects of the company’s fiscal year 2021 financial guidance and assumptions remain the same.

RPM International Guides Q3 Net Sales Growth Above Estimates – Quick Facts

While reporting financial results for the second quarter on Wednesday, RPM International Inc. (RPM) provided sales growth guidance for the third quarter.

For the third quarter, the company now projects consolidated sales growth in the mid-single digits with strong leverage to the bottom line for adjusted EBIT growth of 30% or more.

On average, 9 analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expect the company to report a net sales growth of 2.8 percent to $1.21 billion for the quarter.

The company added that the third quarter typically provides modest sales activity each year because it falls during the winter months when painting and construction activity slow.

It expects sales to be flat to negative in the Construction Products Group and negative sales growth to continue in the Performance Coatings Group. The Consumer Group is expected to continue its double-digit sales growth and will benefit on both the top and bottom line from the recent acquisition of Ali Industries. It also anticipates positive sales growth from the Specialty Products Group to continue into the third quarter

Looking ahead, sales in all four segments should be up in the fiscal 2021 fourth quarter due to an easier comparison to last year’s fourth quarter, which is when the economic interruption caused by the pandemic was most severe.