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The Dow Jones ended 300 points higher, while the S&P 500 gained 0.4%. The Nasdaq underperformed but ended 0.2% in the green aided by a 5% surge in Nvidia shares.
Alphabet and AMD were the big drags on the Nasdaq in regular trading on Wednesday after their quarterly results. Both shares fell 6% each. Ford shares fell in extended trading after a profit warning.
UnitedHealth Group Inc. pared losses to 1% after saying it contacted the US Securities and Exchange Commission with concerns about investor Bill Ackman’s since-deleted X post suggesting the company overstated profits. Uber Technologies Inc. slid 7.6% on a weak gross bookings guidance.Wall Street has been whipsawed by uneven economic data, trade tensions and questions on whether the billions of dollars spent on artificial intelligence will start to pay off. To Mark Hackett at Nationwide, the flurry of market-moving headlines in the first few weeks of 2025 serves as a stark reminder to investors that volatility can emerge unexpectedly.
“Within the US stock market, we like large caps — particularly S&P 493 companies — which should expand profit margins as they adopt productivity-boosting technologies,” said Ed Yardeni, founder of his namesake research firm. “We do not believe the Mag Seven are grossly overvalued. However, we see room for the S&P 493 to outperform.”The yield on 10-year Treasuries declined nine basis points to 4.42%. The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index fell 0.2%.
Legendary short seller Jim Chanos says no one can see the biggest risks facing US markets over the next six to 12 months — because the challenges are going to be unpredictable events, like the recent DeepSeek concern that wiped out roughly $1 trillion in market value from US stocks.
“The real risks will be something like DeepSeek that comes out of left field that changes people’s thinking,” Chanos said in an interview with Bloomberg TV Wednesday. “By definition, we do not know what that is.”
So far this year, 75% of stocks have beaten consensus earnings-per-share estimates, while 66% have exceeded revenue estimates, they said. While those rates are strong relative to history, we’ve also seen 8% of companies lower guidance — compared to just 5% that have raised guidance.
As traders gear up for Friday’s jobs report, data showed employment at US companies picked up in January by more than forecast, highlighting resilient labor growth despite mounting uncertainty.
