Wall Street's main indexes all ended higher on Monday, with both the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the Nasdaq Composite making it three straight wins, aided by gains by many of the so-called Magnificent Seven tech stocks on a holiday-thinned trading day.
Meta Platforms, Nvidia and Tesla all closed between 2.3% and 3.7% higher, with Apple, Amazon, and Google parent Alphabet also in positive territory.
The gains helped propel the Nasdaq Composite and the Dow Jones Industrial Average to their third straight increases, and a second advance in three sessions for the S&P 500.
Market Snapshot
The S&P 500 gained 43.22 points, or 0.73%, to 5,974.07 points, and the Nasdaq Composite rose 192.29 points, or 0.98%, to 19,764.89. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 66.69 points, or 0.16%, to 42,906.95.
Market Movers
Quantum computing stocks surged. D-Wave Systems Inc. rose 27%; Rigetti Computing rose 17%.
Qualcomm was up 3.5% after a jury in Delaware sided with the chip maker in its long-running licensing dispute with Arm Holdings, the chip design company. Arm had claimed that Qualcomm violated the terms of a licensing agreement it had with Nuvia, a company that Qualcomm purchased in 2021 for $1.4 billion. But the jury sided with Qualcomm, which countered the technology that was transferred from Nuvia was covered under its own license agreement with Arm. Shares of Arm declined 4%.
Broadcom rose 5.5% and was the best-performing stock in the S&P 500. Including its performance Monday, the chip maker's shares have risen 108% this year and 40% over the past month. Jefferies analyst Blayne Curtis last week raised his price target on Broadcom to $300 from $225. He has a Buy recommendation on Broadcom, which recently saw its market cap surpass $1 trillion.
Tesla Motors rose 2.3%. The stock fell 3.5% on Friday, making it the S&P 500's worst-performing stock in the session. "To me, [ Tesla stock] was wildly overbought and long hedge funds needed a reason to take some profits," said Future Fund Active ETF co-founder and Tesla shareholder Gary Black. Coming into Monday, Tesla shares have risen 74% this year, and nearly 70% since the Nov. 5 U.S. presidential election.
Rumble Inc. stock surged 81% to $13.03 after the video platform entered an agreement for a $775 million investment from cryptocurrency company Tether. Tether agreed to purchase about 103.3 million Rumble shares at $7.50 a share. Rumble said it anticipates using $250 million to support growth initiatives, with the remaining proceeds to fund a self-tender offer for up to 70 million class A common shares. The livestreaming platform went public in 2022 after merging with a special purpose acquisition company at an initial enterprise value of $2.1 billion.
Honda and Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. said they planned to merge in 2026, with the boards of both Japanese auto makers formally approving the start of merger talks on Monday. The companies said a definitive merger agreement would be signed in June 2025. Honda and Nissan will create a joint holding company that would integrate the operations of both car makers. U.S.-listed shares of Honda surged 13% on Monday.
Shares of Eli Lilly rose 3.7% after the Food and Drug Administration approved Zepbound, the company's weight-loss drug, for moderate-to-severe obstructive sleep apnea in adults with obesity. Eli Lilly said Zepbound was the "first and only prescription medicine for adults" with the condition. Lilly shares were extending gains from Friday when they rose 1.4% after rival Novo Nordisk saw its U.S.-listed shares tumble 18% following a late-stage trial that found experimental drug CagriSema didn't work as well as expected. Novo-Nordisk A/S was up 4.4%.
Meanwhile, shares of ResMed, a maker of continuous positive airway pressure device, or CPAP, devices, were down 2.6% after Lilly received the FDA clearance for Zepbound to treat sleep apnea in certain patients.
Nordstrom was down 1.5% to $24.17. The retailer announced that the Nordstrom family and El Puerto de Liverpool will acquire all of the outstanding common shares of the company they don't already own for $24.25 a share in cash, or about $6.25 billion on an enterprise basis. Upon completion of the transaction, Nordstrom will become private, the company said.
Wal-Mart declined 2.1% and was the session's worst-performing stock in the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau said it was suing the retailer and its fintech partner, Branch Messenger, for allegedly opening deposit accounts for more than 1 million delivery drivers illegally. Both Walmart and Branch denied the allegations in separate statements to Barron's while pledging to defend themselves in court.
Market News
MicroStrategy Adds to Bitcoin Holdings for Seventh Straight Week
MicroStrategy acquired 5,262 bitcoin for a total of $561M for the week ended Dec. 22, the company disclosed on Monday, marking its seventh consecutive weekly bitcoin purchase.
That takes its total bitcoin holdings to 444,262 tokens. Purchased at an average price of $106,622 per BTC, the latest purchase brings the value of MicroStrategy's overall stash to $42.2B at current prices.
The news comes on the same day that MicroStrategy shares were included in the Nasdaq 100 index.
Apple Approaches $4 Trillion Valuation as Investors Bet on AI Momentum
Apple is closing in on a historic $4 trillion stock market valuation, powered by investors cheering progress in the company's long-awaited AI enhancements to rejuvenate sluggish iPhone sales.
The latest rally in Apple shares reflects "investor enthusiasm for artificial intelligence and an expectation that it will result in a supercycle of iPhone upgrades," said Tom Forte, an analyst at Maxim Group, who has a "hold" rating.
Valued at about $3.86 trillion as of the last close, Apple dwarfs the combined value of Germany and Switzerland's main stock markets.
Rumble Continues Rallying in Heavy Volume Trading After Tether Joins as Investor
Shares in conservative video content platform Rumble Inc. nearly doubled on Monday, extending Friday's post-market gains after it received a $775M investment from crypto firm Tether, which owns the namesake stable coin.
Over 58.22 million RUM shares have changed hands just before 1 pm ET, nearly 22x its 3-month daily moving average. Short interest on the stock is 13.4%.
