Stock market news, opening bell, August 8, 2018

Snap
CEO Evan Spiegel.
Getty/Michael
Kovac

Here is what you need to know.

The trade war escalates. The second tranche of
President Donald Trump’s tariffs on Chinese goods is set to take
effect August 23, hitting $16 billion worth of imports.

Elon Musk wants to remove Tesla from the stock
market. “Am considering taking Tesla private at
$420. Funding secured,” the CEO tweeted before issuing a formal
statement on the company’s website.

Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund reportedly amassed a
$2 billion stake in Tesla.
According to the
Financial Times, Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund now
owns 3% to 5% of Tesla’s outstanding stock.

Snap beat on Q2 earnings but reported its first drop in daily
active users. The stock initially soared by as much
as 13% in after-hours trading before giving back the gains.

Disney
earnings miss. Second-quarter profit was weaker than
expected because of higher programming costs and a drop in ESPN
subscribers.

Mutual funds are bleeding cash at an unprecedented rate, and
they’re increasingly vulnerable to a meltdown.
According to Moody’s, investors have pulled cash from actively
managed equity mutual funds in the US at the fastest year-to-date
pace on record.

One in two initial coin offerings failed in the 2nd quarter — and
those that succeeded suffered huge losses. The
average return for ICO tokens in the quarter was -55%, compared
with a gain of nearly 50% in the first quarter.

Salesforce just promoted its top salesman to the title of
co-CEO. Keith Block, formerly the chief operating
officer, will lead with longtime CEO Marc Benioff and report
directly to Salesforce’s board of directors.

More
earnings are on tap. Yelp, 21st Century Fox, Monster
Beverage, and the travel-fare aggregator Booking Holdings report
after the closing bell.

US
equity futures are slightly higher. The 10-year
yield is up by less than 1 basis point at 2.975%.