Wall Street's holiday cheer ended abruptly on Friday, with all three main benchmarks closing lower in a broad-based sell-off affecting even tech and growth stocks that had driven markets higher through much of the shortened trading week.
Market Snapshot
The Dow fell 333.59 points, or 0.77%, to 42,992.21. The S&P 500 lost 66.75 points, or 1.11%, to finish at 5,970.84 points, while the Nasdaq Composite dropped 298.33 points, or 1.49%, to end at 19,722.03.
Market Movers
Tesla - Tesla fell 5%, extending losses from Thursday, when the auto maker fell 1.8%. Tesla has gained 74% this year. The electric-vehicle maker is set to releasefourth-quarter deliveriesnext week. Wall Street expects Tesla to deliver around 510,00 vehicles, a record for any quarter but short of the company’s 515,000 goal.
Nvidia, Broadcom, Marvell Technology - Nvidia dipped 2.1%. Shares of the chip manufacturer have gained 175% this year. While Nvidia is best known as a producer of graphics processing units, or GPUs, the company has also developed an AI geospatial model of Earth. Dion Harris, the company’s director of accelerated data center solutions, told Barron’s that organizations like the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have already adopted Nvidia’s Earth-2. Shares of Broadcom and Marvell Technology were also falling assemiconductor stocks slid on Friday.
Palantir, Vistra Energy - Shares of Palantir Technologies and Vistra, two of the market’s most high-profile winners, fell 3.7% and 3.1%, respectively.
Super Micro Computer - Super Micro Computer declined 5.2% after falling 1.7% on Thursday. The stock has beentumultuous this year, rising as high as $119 and dipping as low as $18. While shares of Super Micro were initially swept up in a wave of enthusiasm for artificial intelligence, delayed financial reports and the resignation of the company’s previous accountant sent the stock price back down. The server maker has gained 13% since Jan. 1.
Netflix - Shares of Netflix declined 1.8%. The streaming service pulled off its coverage of two Christmas Day NFL games largely without a hitch, avoiding the lag and buffering issues that affected the Jake Paul-Mike Tyson boxing match in November. However, Netflix’s success appears to have beenpriced into the stock. As the streamer continues to invest in live sports, some analysts havereiterated bullish viewswhile others remain cautious. The stock has risen 86% this year.
Rigetti Computing - Rigetti Computing jumped 10.6% to $17.08 following a record close on Thursday. The stock has been soaring this month in response to a wave of enthusiasm about quantum computing.
Rumble - Rumble, the livestreaming platform, fell 6.4% after jumping 28% on Thursday. The stock has gained 231% this year. Rumble said earlier this weekthat Tether, the issuer of a digital token of the same name, had agreed to invest $775 million investment in the company. The news came after Rumble’s board approved the purchase of up to $20 million in Bitcoin in November.
Bitcoin itself was reversing earlier gains on Friday. Bitcoin has fallen 0.8% to $94,537 in the past 24 hours, on track for a second straight week of losses. The incoming Trump administration has made it clear it will take a lighter touch in regulating cryptos and has toyed with the idea of creating a national reserve of Bitcoin, fueling interest in the digital currency.
Faraday Future - Faraday Future shares soared 33.3% on Friday. The EV maker recently announced that it has secured approximately $30 million in cash financing commitments.
Coinbase - Ethereum and XRP have gained over the past 24 hours, while Solana has fallen 1.4%. Coinbase declined 3.2% on the back of Bitcoin’s losses. Coinbase is the largest crypto trading platform in the U.S., with $185 billion in trading volume last quarter.
Amedisys - Shares of Amedisys, the hospice care provider, rose 4.7% after the company agreed towaive its rightto terminate a merger agreement with UnitedHealth Group. Amedisys agreed to be acquired for $3.3 billion in 2023, but the Justice Department filed acivil antitrust lawsuitin an attempt to block the deal. TD Cowen analysts said Friday’s announcement is a sign the companies “will find a resolution and complete the merger.”
Lamb Weston - Lamb Weston, formerly one of the biggest losers, rose 2.6%. The stock sank 23% last week after the supplier of french fries and other potato products posted an unexpected quarterly loss, slashed its financial guidance, and named a new CEO.
Market News
Trump Asks Supreme Court to Pause Law Threatening TikTok Ban
President-elect Donald Trump asked the US Supreme Court to pause a law that would ban the TikTok social media platform on Jan. 19 if it isn’t sold by its Chinese parent company.
Trump said the court should give him time after his Jan. 20 inauguration to “pursue a political resolution” of the dispute. He didn’t take a position on the constitutionality of the disputed law, which Congress enacted on a bipartisan basis earlier this year.
Trump said in the filing that he “possesses the consummate dealmaking expertise, the electoral mandate, and the political will to negotiate a resolution to save the platform while addressing the national security concerns expressed by the government.”
OpenAI Outlines New for-Profit Structure in Bid to Stay Ahead in Costly AI Race
OpenAI on Friday outlined plans to revamp its structure, saying it would create a public benefit corporation to make it easier to "raise more capital than we'd imagined," and remove the restrictions imposed on the startup by its current nonprofit parent.
The acknowledgement and detailed rationale behind its high-profile restructuring confirmed a Reuters report in September, which sparked debate among corporate watchdogs and tech moguls including Elon Musk. At issue were the implications such a move might have on whether OpenAI would allocate its assets to the nonprofit arm fairly, and how the company would strike a balance between making a profit and generating social and public good as it develops AI.
Under the proposed plan, the ChatGPT maker's existing for-profit arm would become a Delaware-based public benefit corporation (PBC) - a structure designed to consider the interests of society in addition to shareholder value.