skyrocketed

One of the better-performing stocks on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) Wednesday was Hillenbrand (HI 18.20%). The specialized industrial company saw its share price leap more than 18% on news that it’s going private in a splashy buyout deal. That rise was far more pronounced than the S&P 500‘s (^GSPC 0.40%) 0.4% bump.

A $3.8 billion buyout

Before the NYSE opened for trading that day, Hillenbrand announced it has signed a definitive agreement to be acquired by an unnamed affiliate of private equity firm Lone Star Funds. The deal will be effected entirely in cash, to the tune of $32 per Hillenbrand share. All told, the company said, the enterprise value of the arrangement is around $3.8 billion.

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Hillenbrand said that the purchase price represents a premium of around 37% over its Aug. 12 closing share price.

In the press release trumpeting the deal, the company quoted chairperson of its board of directors Helen Cornell as saying that it “delivers immediate and certain cash value to our shareholders at a substantial premium to recent trading.”

She added that it also “positions Hillenbrand to continue meeting and exceeding customers’ needs for highly engineered, mission-critical processing equipment and solutions.”

Bye bye, stock market

When the buyout closes, Hillenbrand will delist from the NYSE, and thus no longer be publicly traded. The company anticipates the buyout will be completed by the end of the first calendar quarter of 2026. It is subject to approval by its shareholders, and that of the relevant regulatory bodies.

Clinical-stage biotech Protagonist Therapeutics (PTGX 29.76%) was all the rage on the stock market Friday. The company’s share price closed a dizzying 29.8% higher on the day, thanks to intense takeover speculation. That leap was particularly notable considering it was quite a downbeat day for stocks overall, with the S&P 500 (^GSPC -2.71%) sliding by almost 3%.

Sale in the works?

That speculation was fired that morning by The Wall Street Journal, which reported healthcare giant Johnson & Johnson was in discussions to acquire Protagonist. Although it gleaned this from unidentified “people familiar with the matter,” the financial newspaper had few details to report about the apparent negotiations.

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Protagonist is well known to Johnson & Johnson, as the two companies collaborate on the development of a drug that combats immune disorders such as ulcerative colitis. If and when the medication is developed successfully and comes to market, Johnson & Johnson will hold its exclusive commercialization rights.

If the report is accurate, the would-be acquirer wouldn’t be snapping up Protagonist at a bargain. Thanks largely to positive results in clinical trials for several of its pipeline drugs, the biotech’s share price had risen in excess of 70% year to date — and that was before Friday’s monster pop.

Mum’s the word… for now

Neither Protagonist nor Johnson & Johnson has yet commented on the WSJ report, which is par for the course in early stages of such events. I should stress that this has to be considered speculation at this point, although I would advise investors of either company (or both) to keep a sharp eye on how the apparent deal might shape up.

USA Rare Earth (USAR 14.99%) posted huge gains in Thursday’s trading session. The deep-sea mining specialist’s share price gained 15%, even though the Dow Jones Industrial Average index declined 0.6% in the day’s trading. Meanwhile, the S&P 500 declined 0.3%, and the Nasdaq Composite declined 0.1%.

The key factors that pushed the broader market lower today were the same ones that powered big gains for USA Rare Earth stock. China plans to cut down on its export of rare-earth minerals to the U.S., but that could present a big opportunity for USA Rare Earth.

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Is USA Rare Earth stock a buy right now?

China is the world’s leading supplier of rare-earth minerals. According to some estimates, the country accounts for approximately 70% of global rare-earth mineral sourcing. If relations between the U.S. and China continue to worsen, the U.S. will likely have to increase its domestic sourcing of rare-earth minerals and trade in the category with aligned countries.

USA Rare Earth’s business is still in a pre-revenue state, and that makes the company a risky investment almost by definition. This characteristic makes it riskier than more well-established mining stocks. Conversely, the company expects to begin production at its Stillwater, Oklahoma, magnet facility next year and has other projects that could shift into production mode within the next two years.

USA Rare Earth continues to be a high-risk investment, and the stock is too growth-dependent to be a good fit for risk-averse investors. On the other hand, the company’s potential to play a leading role in supplying rare-earth minerals to the U.S. makes it a potentially explosive play.