NVIDIA, the top stock by trading volume, closed up 1.41% with a turnover of $41.673 billion. The company reported earnings after Wednesday's market close, with adjusted earnings per share of $1.62 for the fourth quarter, surpassing market expectations of $1.53. CEO Jensen Huang stated that customers are racing to invest in AI computing power. Tesla, the second most actively traded stock, closed up 1.96%. Media reported on February 25 that a US judge has decided to allow a hiring discrimination lawsuit against Tesla to proceed, while also noting the plaintiff's evidence was weak and expressing skepticism about the ultimate success of the case. The lawsuit alleges that Tesla discriminated against US citizens in its hiring process, favoring visa-holding foreign employees to reduce labor costs. In a brief ruling issued Monday evening, US District Court Judge Vince Chhabria in San Francisco stated that plaintiff Scott Taub, who filed the proposed class action last September, had presented "just enough" factual allegations regarding Tesla's hiring practices for the case to move to the next stage. Microsoft, the third most traded stock, closed up 2.98% with a turnover of $17.19 billion. Japan's Fair Trade Commission conducted an on-site investigation of Microsoft's Japanese subsidiary on suspicion of violating antitrust laws. The Japanese regulator believes Microsoft may have leveraged its dominant position in office software and operating systems to engage in unfair competition in the cloud services market. Specifically, Japanese companies using Microsoft software on competing cloud platforms like Amazon face higher fees compared to using it on Microsoft's own Azure platform. Regulators view this differential pricing as potentially steering customers toward Microsoft's platform, adversely affecting market competition. Advanced Micro Devices, the sixth most traded stock, closed down 1.39% with a turnover of $9.135 billion. The company signed a multi-year agreement with Meta Platforms to supply up to 6GW of GPUs. The deal also includes performance-based warrants allowing Meta to purchase up to 160 million AMD shares. Meta Platforms, the tenth most traded stock, closed up 2.25% with a turnover of $7.283 billion. Both Meta and AMD announced a five-year strategic partnership, with Meta deploying 6GW of AMD GPUs (a transaction valued at tens of billions per gigawatt capacity). In exchange, AMD will provide performance-based warrants for up to 160 million shares (approximately 10% equity). Analysts view this partnership as reflecting Meta's strong expansion ambitions in AI and a significant step for AMD to compete directly with industry leader NVIDIA. Netflix, the fourteenth most traded stock, closed up 5.97% with a turnover of $5.545 billion. Paramount has raised its cash offer for Warner Bros. Discovery to $31 per share. The new proposal includes a $7 billion regulatory termination fee and a $2.8 billion breakup fee payable to Netflix if Warner Bros. withdraws from the existing agreement. The merger agreement between Netflix and Warner Bros. Discovery, reached last December at $27.75 per share, remains in effect and is expected to close in the third quarter of 2026. Senior analyst Gary Black predicts Netflix will prevail in the bidding war. Coinbase Global, the seventeenth most traded stock, closed up 13.52% with a turnover of $4.216 billion. Coinbase announced it has opened stock and ETF trading to all US customers, marking the company's official expansion from digital assets into traditional securities and advancing its goal of becoming a one-stop trading platform. Following this launch, users can buy and sell US-listed stocks and ETFs on the same platform used for crypto assets.
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