The Nasdaq and S&P 500 posted modest gains on Tuesday, a day ahead of major inflation data, weighed down by financial stocks as investors braced for major U.S. banks to kick off earnings reporting season on Friday.
Market Snapshot
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 9.13 points, or 0.02%, to 38,883.67. The S&P 500 gained 7.52 points, or 0.15%, at 5,209.91 and the Nasdaq Composite added 52.68 points, or 0.32%, at 16,306.64.
Market Movers
Tesla (TSLA) - Tesla closed up 2.3% after rising 4.9% on Monday. The electric-vehicle company reached a settlement with the family of a driver who died in a 2018 crash involving the company’s driver-assistance technology Autopilot, just days before the trial was about to begin. The terms of the settlement weren’t disclosed in court records, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Nvidia (NVDA) - Shares of Nvidia fell 2%. The stock has come off recent highs, and one analyst said a sharper decline was on the way. D.A. Davidson analyst Gil Luria said major AI chip customers such as Amazon.com and Microsoft likely will be shifting a greater amount of their investment toward in-house hardware and he calls for a “significant cyclical downturn by 2026” for Nvidia. Luria has a Hold rating on Nvidia stock and a $620 target price, which is among the lowest of any Wall Street analyst.
Tilray (TLRY) - Tilray Brands sank 20.7% after reporting a fiscal third-quarter loss wider than expectations and issuing disappointing fiscal-year guidance.
Moderna (MRNA) - Moderna rose 6.2% and was the top performer in the S&P 500 on Tuesday. Fellow vaccine maker Pfizer said Tuesday it would ask the Food and Drug Administration to expand the approval of its respiratory syncytial virus vaccine to include all adults over the age of 18. Moderna expects launch its own RSV shot later this year. Pfizer rose 0.8%.
Boeing (BA) - Boeing fell 1.9% after the aerospace giant said it delivered 24 737 MAX jets in March, down 54% from a year earlier. In the first quarter, Boeing delivered a total of 83 planes, including 67 MAX jets. The company delivered 130 jets, including 111 MAX jets, in the first quarter of 2023.
BlackBerry (BB) - BlackBerry rose 7.6% after it announced a collaboration with Advanced Micro Devices on robotics-focused hardware platforms. AMD shares rose 0.5%.
Trump Media & Technology Group (DJT) - Trump Media & Technology Group rose 0.8% after falling earlier in the session. Shares of the parent company of social media site Truth Social fell 8.4% on Monday and have dropped around 26% over the past five days. Donald Trump’s stake in the company has lost billions in value over the last two weeks.
Neogen (NEOG) - Neogen, the food-safety company, reduced its fiscal-year revenue guidance, citing slower-than-expected recovery of order-fulfillment rates, and the stock fell 9.3%.
Freeport McMoRan (FCX) - Freeport McMoRan rose 2.6% to $51.30. Shares of the copper company were upgraded to Buy from Neutral at BofA Securities with a price target of $59.
Harmonic (HLIT) - Harmonic concluded a review of its video business, saying that current market conditions didn’t support a transaction. The video-streaming and broadband company also said CEO Patrick Harshman would retire on June 11. He will be succeeded by Nimrod Ben-Natan, general manager of Harmonic’s broadband business. Shares fell 14.6%.
Market News
Google Unveils Arm-Based Data Center Processor, New AI Chip
Google on Tuesday revealed the details of a new version of its data center artificial intelligence chips and announced an Arm-based, based central processor.
Google plans to offer the Arm-based central processing unit (CPU) called Axion via Google Cloud. The company said it has superior performance to x86 chips, and general-purpose Arm chips in the cloud.
Intel Unveils New AI Accelerator in Bid to Challenge Nvidia
Intel Corp. is rolling out a new version of its artificial intelligence chip, aiming to challenge Nvidia Corp. in one of the fastest-growing parts of the semiconductor industry.
The updated processor, called Gaudi 3, will be widely available in the third quarter, Intel said at a company event Tuesday. The chip is designed to boost performance in two key areas: helping train AI systems — a process that involves bombarding them with data — and running the finished software.