Source: Sina US Stocks On the evening of the 20th Beijing time, the US stocks opened mixed on Thursday, and then the three major indexes rose slightly. Nvidia hit another new high and consolidated its position as the largest market cap company in the US stock market. Initial jobless claims in the United States last week were higher than expected, and real estate and manufacturing indexes were below expectations. Until the manuscript was submitted, the S&P 500 index rose 0.29% to break through 5500 points, the Nasdaq Composite Index rose 0.37%, and the Dow Jones Index rose 0.13%. The US stock market was closed on Wednesday due to the June holiday (Juneteenth). On Tuesday, the S&P 500 index and the Nasdaq both set new historical highs. The US stock market is expected to record gains this week. The S&P 500 index set its 31st new high this year on Tuesday. Due to the continued AI craze and the resilience of economic growth, it is expected to continue to support corporate profits, especially in the technology sector. Nvidia's stock price hit another new high. The AI darling and chip maker surpassed Microsoft last Tuesday and became the world's most valuable company. Against the background of the continued AI craze boosting the stock market, Nvidia's stock price has risen 174% from 2024 to date. As Nvidia consolidates its position as a thriving market leader in the AI theme market, its market value has surpassed that of Apple in early June. "Nvidia is still the most important stock in the world," said Chris Weston, head of Pepperstone research, in a report. However, Weston warned that the overall performance of the index market was poor, and the market participation was mediocre, suggesting that the rise was built on an unstable foundation. "The fact remains that the market is still very bullish on AI-related stocks and large tech stocks, and given the lack of clear immediate risks, the path of least resistance is for stock indices to rise." While consumer spending has shown signs of slowing and hints at potential economic weakness, investors continue to flock to the AI giant. The rise of Nvidia has also boosted its peers. Chip maker Broadcom has surged more than 60% from 2024 to date. Scott Chronert, Citigroup's US stock strategy director, wrote in a report on Tuesday: "We still believe that Wall Street (the S&P 500) is diverging from the corporate sector (the foundation of the US economy), is this strange? There is no doubt that generative AI is currently infiltrating the US stock market environment as a sustained driver of growth." Nevertheless, some commentators have noted that while this doldrums has not yet fully affected the US stock market, which repeatedly sets new highs, the rise lacks breadth beyond the largest tech companies, and this situation may continue to deteriorate. Thomas Fitzpatrick, managing director of R.J. O'Brien and Associates, said, "There's a feeling of AI theme that's very similar to the 2000-2001 US stock style, but as we know, markets stay irrational longer than you stay solvent. But for now, it's hard to stop the speeding train." Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at CFRA Research, said that due to three major unfavorable factors that will suppress stock prices, the US stock market will see a correction. This Wall Street veteran pointed out that so far this year, the stock market has performed strongly, with the S&P 500 index up 15% from 2024. However, he predicted that the benchmark index would fall 5% due to unfavorable interest rates, inflation, and stock valuations. The inflation rate is declining but still above the Federal Reserve's target of 2%, leading Fed officials to expect only one interest rate cut by year-end. As for Thursday's economic data, the initial claims for unemployment benefits in the United States were almost unchanged last week, and the data for the previous week rose sharply. These data tend to fluctuate before and after holidays and school vacations. Data released by the US Department of Labor on Thursday showed that as of June 15, the number of initial claims for unemployment benefits decreased by 5,000 to 238,000. The number of continued claims for unemployment benefits as of June 8 rose to 1.82 million. In the past year, the number of people applying for unemployment benefits has remained low as the labor market has shown resilience in the face of high prices and high interest rates. The four-week moving average of initial jobless claims rose to 232,750, the highest level since September last year.
On the evening of the 17th Beijing time, the US stock market opened collectively low on Wednesday, and then the Dow Jones Index turned strong to achieve a historic high! As of press time, it rose 0.27%, fell 1.76%, and fell 0.9%; sector rotation is still continuing, recent technology stocks such as Nvidia have been sold off. The market continues to focus on the prospects of US stock earnings reports and rate cuts by the Federal Reserve this year. Large technology stocks such as Apple and Tesla generally declined. This sign indicates that large technology companies that have had amazing performances this year are being sold off. In the first half of this year, the market enthusiasm stimulated by the AI boom promoted the rise of large technology stocks. On Tuesday, US stocks rose sharply, with the Dow Jones closing up more than 740 points, a historic high. Small-cap stocks continue to rise, with the Russell 2000 index of small-cap stocks rising 3.5% and recording a fifth consecutive day of gains.$Dow Jones Industrial Average (.DJI.US)$Rise 0.28%,$Nasdaq Composite Index (.IXIC.US)$Fall 2.31%,$S&P 500 Index (.SPX.US)$Fall 1.16%; Sector rotation continues, winners of recent technology sectors such as Nvidia are being sold off. The market continues to focus on the prospects of US earnings reports and rate cuts by the Federal Reserve this year.
Large technology stocks such as Apple and Tesla generally declined. This sign indicates that large technology companies that have had amazing performances this year are being sold off. In the first half of this year, the market enthusiasm stimulated by the AI boom promoted the rise of large technology stocks.
The special pressure on the semiconductor sector in technology stocks is due to the trade policy risks of the US government. According to reports, the US government is considering implementing stricter trade control measures to prevent some technology companies from providing technology to certain countries.
On Tuesday, US stocks rose sharply, with the Dow Jones closing up more than 740 points, a historic high. Small-cap stocks continue to rise, with the Russell 2000 index of small-cap stocks rising 3.5% and recording a fifth consecutive day of gains.
Chief investment officer of the Independent Advisor Alliance Chris Zaccarelli said:" He has lagged behind the S&P 500 index for most of the past two years. But this summer, it has gained new momentum, as investors expect leadership in the US stock market to expand from a small number of technology companies to broader industries and individual stocks across the economy."$Dow Jones Industrial Average (.DJI.US)$Chief investment officer of the Independent Advisor Alliance Chris Zaccarelli said:" He has lagged behind the S&P 500 index for most of the past two years. But this summer, it has gained new momentum, as investors expect leadership in the US stock market to expand from a small number of technology companies to broader industries and individual stocks across the economy."
As traders became more optimistic about the prospects of the Federal Reserve's interest rate cuts, more sectors participated in pushing the stock market higher, which should benefit small-cap stocks and companies with higher financing costs.
According to the CME's FedWatch Tool, federal funds futures trading indicates a 100% chance that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates in September.
Recent inflation data for June's CPI and PPI were better than expected, while there were further signs of cooling in the labor market. Economists and investors believe that these data mean that once the inflation rate approaches the Federal Reserve's target level of 2%, the Federal Reserve will soon begin to cut interest rates.
Matthew Luzzetti, chief US economist at Deutsche Bank, wrote in a research report on July 12:" Recent data shows that the labor market is still weakness and the inflation pressure has dropped significantly, especially in all important housing categories." The research report predicts that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates in September.
On Wednesday's economic data, the US Department of Commerce reported that new home construction activity in the US increased in June, due to an increase in multi-family housing projects and an increase in data on new home starts in June.
In June, the new home starts rose by 3% to 1.35 million households. Economic analysts predict that the number of new home starts will be 1.3 million households according to the median of the survey by the institutions. The construction permit rate, which represents future construction activity, increased by 3.4% to 1.45 million households.
The data also showed that single-family home starts in June fell further but may rebound in the coming months as optimism about a Federal Reserve rate cut in September grows. The data showed that in June, housing starts for single-family homes fell 2.2% on a month-on-month basis, adjusted for seasonal factors, equivalent to an annual rate of 0.98 million. Single-family home starts account for most of housing construction. Building permits for single-family homes fell 2.3% to 0.934 million units. However, single-family housing starts in June increased by 5.4% year-on-year. Strong housing construction was due to the lack of second-hand housing on the market for most of last year and the first quarter of 2024.
The Department of Commerce data shows that single-family home starts in June fell further but may rebound in the coming months as optimism about a Federal Reserve rate cut in September grows. The data showed that in June, housing starts for single-family homes fell 2.2% month-on-month, adjusted for seasonal factors, equivalent to an annual rate of 0.98 million units. Single-family home starts accounted for most of housing construction. Building permits for single-family homes fell 2.3% to 0.934 million units. However, single-family housing starts in June increased by 5.4% year-on-year. Strong housing construction was due to the lack of second-hand housing on the market for most of last year and the first quarter of 2024.
Focus stocks
Affected by the risk of US government trade policies, most semiconductor stocks fell.$ASML Holding (ASML.US)$Falls more than 11% after earnings announcement,$Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM.US)$,$Advanced Micro Devices (AMD.US)$Fall by more than 7%.$Qualcomm (QCOM.US)$Down more than 6%.$NVIDIA (NVDA.US)$Down more than 6%.$Intel (INTC.US)$Rises nearly 5% against the market.
dropped nearly 6%, $NIO Inc (NIO.US)$,$PDD Holdings (PDD.US)$It fell more than 2%.$Li Auto (LI.US)$,$Baidu (BIDU.US)$It fell nearly 2%.
Petroleum stocks rise,$Apache (APA.US)$,$Murphy Oil (MUR.US)$up more than 2%,$Occidental Petroleum (OXY.US)$,$ConocoPhillips (COP.US)$,$Marathon Oil (MRO.US)$rose more than 1%.
According to reports, some large technology companies including Apple, Nvidia, Salesforce, and Anthrophic were exposed to use unauthorized data from YouTube, a video website owned by Google, when training AI models.
These companies used a data set called Pile, provided by a third party, which contains a large amount of video subtitle texts scraped from YouTube, violating the rules banning unauthorized content scraping from the platform.
Tesla CEO Musk announced on social media on Wednesday that he would relocate his two companies, SpaceX and X (formerly Twitter), from California to Texas.
According to Musk's tweet, he will move SpaceX's headquarters from Hawthorne, California, to the 'Starbase' in Texas. At the same time, X's headquarters will be relocated from San Francisco to Austin, Texas.
According to reports, Apple has sent a clear signal to more than 1.4 billion iPhone users worldwide in a new round of promotional offensive: recommending users to stop using Google Chrome browser on the iPhone and switch to Apple's Safari browser. This move reflects Apple's high attention to maintaining its share of the browser market and user privacy protection.
Carbon capture company 1PointFive announced recently that it has partnered with$Microsoft (MSFT.US)$Carbon capture company 1PointFive recently announced the signing of a record-breaking carbon removal agreement with [unknown company], in which it will sell 0.5 million tons of carbon removal (CDR) credits to the technology company over six years. This is currently the world's largest CDR credit purchase agreement based on direct air capture (DAC) technology.
1PointFive is a company under Occidental Petroleum, focusing on carbon capture, utilization, and storage. The agreement is an important part of Microsoft's achievement of its carbon negative goal by 2030.
The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has$Amazon (AMZN.US)$The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has launched an informal investigation into the recent transaction between [unknown company] and Adept, an artificial intelligence start-up company. According to a source, FTC is currently seeking more information on the agreement, which involves Amazon hiring key executives and obtaining technology licenses from Adept.
The requirement reflects regulators' increasing concerns about the combination of artificial intelligence transactions. FTC has previously conducted a more extensive review of the cooperation between large technology companies and well-known artificial intelligence startups.
Barclays Bank announced that it has lowered Amazon's target stock price from $230 to $220. The bank maintained its 'shareholding' rating on Amazon. This adjustment may be related to market competition, macroeconomic environment, and company operating efficiency. Despite the target price cut, Barclays remains optimistic about Amazon's long-term growth potential and market position.
According to reports, Google once tried to disrupt the antitrust settlement agreement reached between Microsoft and European cloud computing company by offering about 0.47 billion euros (approximately 3.7 billion yuan) in return. However, it failed in the end.
The report claimed that Google offered a package valued at about 0.512 billion US dollars to the Cloud Infrastructure Services Providers in Europe (CISPE), with the condition that CISPE continued to sue Microsoft for antitrust. This package includes a 5-year Google cloud technology software license worth about 0.455 billion euros and 14 million euros in cash.
According to reports, Dutch authorities refused to$Novo-Nordisk A/S (NVO.US)$The Netherlands authorities refused to include Novo Nordisk's weight-loss drug Wegovy in the country's basic medical insurance program, causing a drop in its stock by more than 3%.
$Gitlab (GTLB.US)$The company, [unknown], is reportedly considering a sale, and GitLab's stock rose by more than 10%.
$Johnson & Johnson (JNJ.US)$Johnson & Johnson's sales in the second quarter were $22.45 billion, exceeding market expectations, and the stock rose by more than 2%.
Bank of America Merrill Lynch lowered its rating.$XPeng (XPEV.US)$Xpeng's sales forecast for the next two years fell by more than 1%.
Editor/Lambor