Trending tickers: Boeing, Vodafone, Adobe, Moderna

Lucy Harley-McKeown

Boeing stock fell around 3.8% in premarket trade after its workers voted to go ahead with a walkout, following a rejected pay deal between union representatives and the company. The proposed deal would have included a 25% pay increase over four years.

More than 30,000 workers walked out on Friday at midnight. The pay deal unions were targeting was a 40% increase, among other measures.

“The message was clear that the tentative agreement we reached with IAM leadership was not acceptable to the members," Boeing said in a statement.

"We remain committed to resetting our relationship with our employees and the union, and we are ready to get back to the table to reach a new agreement."

Around 95% of the union members who voted in the ballot rejected the deal and 96% backed strike action until a new agreement is reached.

Vodafone and Three have pushed back against claims by the UK's competition regulator that their proposed merger will lead to jacked up prices for mobile phone customers.

In the latest chapter of an inquiry first launched in January, the Competition and Markets Authority said earlier this week the deal could weaken competition between providers and harm customers least able to afford mobile phones.

Vodafone stock is following the mood of the market, however, and is up around 0.8% this morning.

The pair struck the agreement to merge in June 2023, with the potential combination set to become the UK's largest phone network. It would serve around 27 million customers.

Moderna stock dropped 12% on Thursday, and looked set to fall a further 3.4% on Friday, after the drugmaker said it would cut its planned research and development spending for 2025 to 2028 by 20% to $16bn (£12bn). This year, it spent around $4.8bn on R&D.

It forecast revenue of $2.5bn to $3.5bn for 2025, below analyst expectations of $3.87bn.

The cut back in R&D is part of its mission to break even on an operating cash basis in 2028, it added. It has enough cash to fund plans until then without raising money, the company said in an update to the market.

Meanwhile, it will reduce its dependance on COVID vaccines, with an expected 10 product approvals over the next three years.

Shares in software maker Adobe were down more than 8% in premarket on Friday, after it was unable to boost investor confidence in its ability to make money off new AI tools in its fourth-quarter sales guidance.

The company has attempted to make the most of the artificial intelligence boom, embedding its software Firefly into subscription products such as Photoshop and Illustrator.

Guidance fell short of Wall Street estimates as it reported that its digital media net new annual recurring revenue would hit $550m to November. Analysts had predicted this metric would hit $561.1m.

Revenue was just short of expectations, hitting $5.55bn, as opposed to the $5.6bn analysts had guessed.

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