MARKET SNAPSHOT
The Nasdaq composite fell for a fourth straight session, while the Dow industrials edged higher. Crude futures rose after reports of an Iranian attack on a cargo ship in the Strait of Hormuz. Treasury yields declined as U.S. indicators suggested the Fed may not need to be as hawkish as priced in by the market. Gold and silver settled higher, snapping a four-day losing streak for both. The U.S. dollar weakened.
MARKET WRAPS
EQUITIES
Blockbuster results from Micron struggled to restore momentum for the Nasdaq composite.
The Nasdaq composite, which has been dinged by worries around AI spending this week, jumped at the open but quickly slid into negative territory. It finished the day down 0.5%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.1%, while the S&P 500 was flat.
Micron shares rallied 16%, and other stocks tied to the AI buildout including Qualcomm, Sandisk and Western Digital also rose. The memory-chip maker's results offered reassurance around the sustainability of the AI boom.
The same trends that powered Micron stock though pressured shares in Apple, which raised prices on its Macs and iPads because demand for memory chips has sent their costs soaring. The iPhone maker's shares dropped 6.1% Thursday, its sharpest one-day fall since April 2025.
Earlier Thursday, markets in Asia ended mostly higher.
Semiconductor-heavy markets led the day advance after the selloff earlier this week. South Korea's Kospi jumped 5.4% and Japan's Nikkei Stock Average closed 4.6% higher.
China's benchmark Shanghai Composite Index rose 0.2%, the Shenzhen Composite Index increased 0.7%, and the ChiNext Price Index climbed 2.8%.
Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index fell 1.4%.
Australia's S&P/ASX 200 Index fell 0.7%.
New Zealand's S&P/NZX 50 Index rose 0.7%.
COMMODITIES
Crude futures settled higher after reports of an Iranian attack on a cargo ship in the Strait of Hormuz raised concerns about how smooth the reopening of the waterway will be.
Oil prices fell briefly to pre-war levels early in the session as the increasing number of tankers crossing the strait eases tight global supplies.
"I don't see a scenario where the war in Iran resumes even after the 60-day negotiating period is over because there is too much to lose on both sides," Mizuho's Robert Yawger said in a note.
WTI settled up 2.2% at $71.92 a barrel. Front-month Brent rose 2.1% to $75.26 a barrel.
Gold and silver settled higher, snapping a four-day losing streak for both.
While finishing with a gain, gold has more room to move lower, said Hamad Hussain of Capital Economics, who doesn't see $4,000 as the bottom.
"We think that more speculative excess could be squeezed out of the gold market," he said.
Hussain attributes this to AI/tech stocks continuing to be the preferred money-maker for speculators, as well as the view that the Kevin Warsh-led Federal Reserve will stay hawkish on interest rates.
Front-month gold futures finished up 1% to $4,030.50/oz, while silver closed up 0.5% to $58.348/oz.
TODAY'S TOP HEADLINES
Fed's Preferred Inflation Gauge Climbs Above Target Range
The Fed's preferred gauge of monthly price increases continued to grow in May, the Commerce Department said Thursday.
The personal-consumption expenditures price index climbed by 0.4% in May, maintaining the same growth of 0.4% in April, the Commerce Department said. Excluding the volatile food and energy categories, core PCE prices rose by 0.3%.
Over the past year, the PCE index is up by 4.1%, its highest reading since April 2023, more than double of the preferred target rate for the Federal Reserve. The core 12-month PCE inflation rate is up 3.4%.
Iran Attacks Cargo Ship, Testing Trump's Deal to Reopen Strait
Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps attacked a Singapore-flagged cargo ship Thursday in the Strait of Hormuz, according to two senior U.S. officials, testing the deal signed last week by the U.S. and Iran to end the fighting and reopen the vital shipping lane.
The attack, which damaged the ship's bridge but left no casualties, according to U.K. Maritime Trade Operations, took place near the coast of Oman hours after the Iranian paramilitary's navy warned ships not to use routes through the waterway that the regime hadn't sanctioned.
On Tuesday, the International Maritime Organization told shippers it was coordinating an evacuation route for the hundreds of ships still stuck in the Persian Gulf in cooperation with Iran, Oman, other coastal states and the U.S.
ON Semiconductor to Buy Synaptics in All-Stock Deal with $7 Billion Enterprise Value
ON Semiconductor agreed to acquire Synaptics in an all-stock transaction with an enterprise value of around $7 billion.
The chip maker on Thursday said it will issue 1.35 shares for each share of Synaptics, which it said represents a roughly 19% premium to the two stocks' volume-weighted average prices over the last 10 trading days.
Shares of ON Semiconductor fell 7.3% to $110.12 after hours.
Bayer Wins Supreme Court Challenge Over Roundup Litigation
The Supreme Court on Thursday ruled for Bayer in its fight against claims that it failed to warn consumers that Roundup causes cancer, boosting the company's efforts to resolve costly litigation over its popular weedkiller.
In a 7-2 decision, the court said the pharmaceutical and agriculture company can't be held liable under state law for failing to warn about the alleged risk when a federal regulator-the Environmental Protection Agency-didn't require the product to carry a warning label.
Bayer, which has been engulfed in litigation over Roundup since acquiring Monsanto in 2018, argued that the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act-which establishes a regulatory scheme for labeling weed-killing chemicals and similar pesticides-prohibits states from imposing different or additional warnings than those required under federal law.
JPMorgan Shakes Up Dimon Succession Race With Two New Presidents
The long-running succession drama at JPMorgan Chase over who will replace Jamie Dimon as chief executive appears to be entering its endgame.
The bank on Thursday promoted Doug Petno and Troy Rohrbaugh to be co-presidents of the firm, named them CEOs of the bank's two biggest businesses and gave them $30 million retention bonuses to stay around.
At the same time, Marianne Lake, currently the head of the consumer bank and a longtime lieutenant to Dimon, announced that she is retiring. Lake, 56, had for years been seen as a top candidate to take over as chief executive of the nation's biggest bank, but she decided to leave as it became clear that she wasn't in the running for the job anymore, people familiar with the matter said.
Apple Raises Prices on Macs, iPads by $200 or More on Some Models
Apple raised the prices of its Macs and iPads early Thursday morning, a week after Chief Executive Tim Cook said the soaring costs of memory and storage chips would force the company's hand.
The company briefly took down its Apple Online Store early this morning as it typically does when announcing new products. When it came back online, the price tags for Mac computers rose roughly 15% to 20% and iPad prices rose 15% to 25%.
Among the price increases, the base MacBook Air rose $200 to $1,299; the base MacBook Pro increased $300 to $1,999; the entry-level MacBook Neo increased $100 to $699. The iPad Air increased $150 to $749 and the iPad Pro increased $200 to $1,199.
Germany's Merck to Boost Lab-Tools Business With $11 Billion Bio-Techne Deal
Germany's Merck KGaA said it struck a deal to buy U.S. life-sciences tools supplier Bio-Techne for $11.3 billion, in an early move under its new chief executive to bulk up its lab-tools business.
The proposed acquisition represents Merck's biggest deal since its $17 billion buyout of Sigma-Aldrich more than a decade ago and comes weeks after the appointment of Kai Beckmann as CEO.Beckmann recently signaled acquisitions would be a key growth driver across the group, which has operations spanning pharmaceuticals, life-sciences equipment and materials for semiconductors and electronic devices. The company veteran succeeded Belen Garijo who left to become CEO of French drugmaker Sanofi.
Suppliers of life-sciences tools are positioning themselves to tap in to pharma companies' stepped up investments in research and development. Biotech companies have also seen a recent influx of funding, after struggling to raise money when central banks raised interest rates after the Covid-19 pandemic. Rival life-science companies Thermo Fisher Scientific and Danaher also made multibillion-dollar acquisitions over the past year.
Expected Major Events for Friday
00:30/JPN: May Detailed Import & Export Statistics
03:00/SKA: May New deposit, loan rates
05:00/SIN: May Industrial Production Index
07:30/THA: Weekly International Reserves
08:00/TAI: May Business Indicators
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(END) Dow Jones Newswires
June 25, 2026 16:54 ET (20:54 GMT)
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