U.S. stock futures rose on Friday after Thursday’s declines. Futures of major benchmark indices were higher.
Thursday’s action was part of a broad selloff across Wall Street that saw U.S. stocks settle lower, with the Nasdaq Composite dipping more than 400 points during the session.
Risk-off sentiment returned sharply, with AI-linked stocks leading the decline and renewed pressure hitting crypto markets.
Meanwhile, reports emerged that the Donald Trump administration has decided to block Nvidia Corp.‘s (NASDAQ:NVDA) sale of its latest scaled-down AI chip to China.
The 10-year Treasury bond yielded 4.11% and the two-year bond was at 3.58%. The CME Group's FedWatch tool‘s projections show markets pricing a 65.1% likelihood of the Federal Reserve cutting the current interest rates during its December meeting.
| Futures | Change (+/-) |
| Dow Jones | 0.19% |
| S&P 500 | 0.27% |
| Nasdaq 100 | 0.31% |
| Russell 2000 | 0.42% |
The SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (NYSE:SPY) and Invesco QQQ Trust ETF (NASDAQ:QQQ), which track the S&P 500 index and Nasdaq 100 index, respectively, rose in premarket on Friday. The SPY was up 0.13% at $671.21, while the QQQ advanced 0.14% to $612.54, according to Benzinga Pro data.
Most sectors on the S&P 500 closed on a negative note, with communication services, consumer discretionary, and information technology stocks recording the biggest losses on Thursday.
However, energy and health care stocks bucked the overall market trend, closing the session higher.
| Index | Performance (+/-) | Value |
| Nasdaq Composite | -1.90% | 23,053.99 |
| S&P 500 | -1.12% | 6,720.32 |
| Dow Jones | -0.84% | 46,912.30 |
| Russell 2000 | -1.86% | 2,418.82 |
According to a new note from LPL Financial, tech's biggest players are pouring “staggering” sums into the artificial intelligence race, even as the core business remains unprofitable.
Capital expenditures from five key hyperscalers, Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN), Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ:MSFT), Alphabet Inc.‘s (NASDAQ:GOOG) (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Google, Meta Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ:META), and Oracle Corp. (NYSE:ORCL) are projected to soar to $600.1 billion by 2027, up from $155.1 billion in 2023.
This 40% compound annual growth rate highlights a sector “fully convinced that this is a race worth winning.” Yet, LPL notes a critical disconnect: “the large language model business that is leveraging these new technologies is currently unprofitable.”
This has fueled concerns over “circular financing,” where chipmakers like Nvidia Corp. invest in their own unprofitable customers to sustain demand. “A more pessimistic take would be that this circular financing is being used to buttress the financial position of unprofitable business lines,” LPL stated.
Analysts are also flagging the use of Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs) to manage risk, a structure LPL notes “is how Enron hid its fraud.” While enthusiasm shows signs of “waning,” LPL concedes the “momentum behind this theme is strong.”
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Here's what investors will be keeping an eye on Friday;
Crude oil futures were trading higher in the early New York session by 1.19% to hover around $60.14 per barrel.
Gold Spot US Dollar rose 0.86% to hover around $4,011.13 per ounce. Its last record high stood at $4,381.6 per ounce. The U.S. Dollar Index spot was 0.11% higher at the 99.8450 level.
Meanwhile, Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) was trading 1.81% lower at $101,152.85per coin.
Asian markets closed lower on Friday, including India’s NIFTY 50, South Korea's Kospi, Japan's Nikkei 225, Australia's ASX 200, Hong Kong's Hang Seng, and China’s CSI 300 indices rose. European markets were also lower in early trade.
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