Stocks search for direction after China data, Citi Q2 earnings Stocks have been fairly quiet to start the week and the major averages are nearly unchanged at noon after Citi (C) gave an in-line report to kick off the bank earnings season. Outside the U.S., China reported its slowest GDP growth in over a quarter of a century, but its data for June topped expectations, giving some hope that the country's economy finished the second quarter with some momentum. ECONOMIC EVENTS: In the U.S., the Empire State manufacturing index bounced 12.9 points to 4.3 in July, though that was after the index had plunged to its weakest level since October 2016 with a reading of -8.6 in June. In China, second quarter GDP growth slowed to 6.2%, which was its lowest in at least 27 years. However, industrial production and retail sales numbers for June topped expectations. TOP NEWS: Shares of Citi (C) are little changed near noon after the bank reported better than expected earnings and revenue for the second quarter. However, excluding an approximately $350M pre-tax gain on Citi's investment in Tradeweb (TW), earnings per share were nearer to what had been forecast by analysts. Shares of both Gilead Sciences (GILD) and Galapagos NV (GLPG) are rising after the companies announced over the weekend that they have entered into a 10-year global research and development collaboration, under which the former will invest $5.1B to raise its stake in the latter and partner with Galapagos to develop and commercialize its treatments. In midday trading, shares of Gilead have gained over 2.5%, while Galapagos has jumped about 17%. In other M&A news, Callon Petroleum (CPE) an agreement to acquire Carrizo Oil & Gas (CRZO) in an all-stock transaction valued at $3.2B. Meanwhile, Crane Co. (CR) announced that absent substantive engagement this week, it will cease its efforts to acquire Circor (CIR) and will not extend its tender offer to acquire all outstanding shares of the company for $48 per share. MAJOR MOVERS: Among the noteworthy gainers was Avrobio (AVRO), which rose 22% after the company announced the first kidney biopsy result and what it called "additional positive data" from two ongoing clinical trials of its AVR-RD-01 investigational gene therapy in Fabry disease. Also higher was Royal Caribbean (RCL), which gained 3% after Nomura Instinet analyst Harry Curtis recommended using the recent pullbacks in shares of the company and peer Norwegian Cruise Line (NCLH) as buying opportunities into their Q2 earnings reports. The analyst expects both companies to have more constructive forward booking commentary than Carnival (CCL) did in its June outlook and beat more recent diminished yield expectations, he said. Among the notable losers was Symantec (SYMC), which fell 13% after CNBC's David Faber reported, citing sources, that Broadcom's (AVGO) talks to acquire the company broke down this weekend over price. Also lower was WestRock (WRK), which fell 3.5% after KeyBanc analyst Adam Josephson downgraded the stock to Underweight from Sector Weight, as he believes his below-consensus estimates are biased downward rather than upward given worsening fundamentals in container board, pulp, and uncoated freesheet. INDEXES: Near midday, the Dow was down 32.75, or 0.12%, to 27,299.28, the Nasdaq was down 3.72, or 0.05%, to 8,240.42, and the S&P 500 was down 3.90, or 0.13%, to 3,009.87. Symbols: $C $GILD $GLPG $CR $CIR $CPE $CRZO $AVRO $RCL $NCLH $CCL $SYMC $AVGO $WRKSource: (thefly.com)