S&P 500, Nasdaq Fall as Tech Stocks Tumble; Dow Closes Little Changed After Touching All-Time High

Biggest S&P 500 Movers on Tuesday

1 hr 8 min ago

Decliners

Shares of analytics software provider Palantir Technologies (PLTR) tumbled over 9%, falling the most of any S&P 500 stock. The slide marked the fifth consecutive day of losses for the stock, which was sitting at record-high levels just a week ago after a strong earnings report. The latest move lower came after short seller Andrew Left of Citron Research expressed concerns about the stock’s valuation, suggesting its price has become disconnected from the company’s fundamentals.
The price of bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies moved lower, extending declines posted over the past week. Shares of Coinbase Global (COIN), operator of the largest U.S. cryptocurrency exchange, sank 5.8%.
Shares of enterprise software provider Oracle (ORCL) also lost 5.8% Tuesday. The company is in the midst of a reorganization and has been cutting jobs, particularly in its cloud infrastructure division as it aims to focus more resources on AI, according to reports last week. Yesterday, Bloomberg reported Mary Ann Davidson, the company’s long-serving chief security officer, would be stepping down from her role.

Advancers

Intel (INTC) shares soared nearly 7%, logging the top performance in the S&P 500 Tuesday. The latest push higher for the struggling chipmaker’s stock followed the announcement of a $2 billion investment by Japan’s SoftBank Group (SFTBY). Masayoshi Son, CEO of SoftBank, said the move reflects the firm’s anticipation of an expansion in U.S. semiconductor manufacturing, and comes amid speculation the Trump administration is evaluating taking a stake in the struggling chipmaker.

Shares of Prologis (PLD), a real estate investment trust focused on warehouses, data centers, and other industrial properties, jumped 5%. Analysts at Mizuho upgraded Prologis to “outperform” from “neutral” and raised their price target, citing a more favorable view on the industrial REIT subsector. Mizuho suggested Prologis could be positioned to benefit from potential interest-rate cuts, as well as growth following the recently passed tax and spending bill.
Palo Alto Networks (PANW) shares added just over 3% after the cybersecurity firm reported quarterly earnings that topped analysts’ forecasts. The company’s outlook for fiscal 2026 also exceeded consensus estimates. Analysts said the strong quarter demonstrated Palo Alto’s success in the implementation of its platformization strategy, positioning itself as a one-stop shop for clients by offering multiple cybersecurity products on a single platform.

-Michael Bromberg

Goldman Weighs in on the ‘Summer of Stablecoins’

1 hr 48 min ago

The first federal regulatory system signed into law brought about something of a summer awakening for stablecoins. Whether the roughly $270 billion global market in tokens pegged to real-world currencies will grow to trillions, and eat into traditional financial services industries, remains to be seen.

Stablecoins, now predominantly used for crypto trading and for dollar access outside of the U.S., have been prophesied to replace and modernize legacy systems with blockchain efficiency. However, total disruption is unlikely, Goldman Sachs Research said in a report published Tuesday.

Analysts including Will Nance and James Yaro wrote that stablecoin benefits will accrue to the infrastructure layer of the financial sector, particularly in interbank payments, as well as settlements in capital markets, complex, and cross-border transactions. However, they see “limited threats” to payments services, including the consumer card ecosystem, and that their collective underperformance presents an opportunity to buy. Visa (V) and Mastercard (MA) are less rivals and more”likely to play a large role in facilitating stablecoin payments at scale in a consumer context,” the report said.

Also, risk to remittance players, including Remitly (RELY) and Western Union (WU), are exaggerated, according to the report.

Goldman thinks GENIUS Act-compliant stablecoins such as Circle’s (CRCL) USDC will take greater share at the expense of USDT, Tether’s offshore stablecoin. The firm sees $77 billion of growth in USDC, or an estimated compound annual growth rate of 40% from 2024 to 2027. Tether’s USDT is the world’s largest stablecoin, with a $165 billion market cap, compared to Circle USDC’s $66 billion, according to research platform rwa.xyz.

However, with Circle’s elevated valuation after its blockbuster IPO earlier this year, Goldman favors Robinhood (HOOD) for its continued innovation in crypto.

-Crystal Kim

Robinhood Customers Can Now Trade on Football Outcomes

2 hr 22 min ago

Fans of the most popular sport in the U.S. can now trade on game outcomes on Robinhood’s app. Just don’t call it “sports betting.”

Robinhood Markets (HOOD) on Tuesday announced the launch of trading “on the outcomes of the most popular pro and college football games, including all regular season pro matchups, and all college Power 4 schools and independents.” (In other words, customers can bet on all NFL games and those involving teams in the Big Ten, SEC, ACC, and Big 12 conferences, as well as the likes of Notre Dame.)

“Football is far and away the most popular sport in America,” said JB Mackenzie, Robinhood’s VP & GM of Futures and International. “Adding pro and college football to our prediction markets hub is a no-brainer for us as we aim to make Robinhood a one-stop shop for all your investing and trading needs.”

The trading platform wants to make clear that these are “event contracts” and not “sports bets.”

“Unlike sports betting, where the firm sets a line, event contracts leverage the power and rigor of financial market structure and are offered in a marketplace where buyers and sellers interact to set the price,” Robinhood said. “Customers can access the contracts in real time and manage risk by adjusting—or exiting—their positions up to and throughout a game before a contract expires.”

Robinhood added that since it debuted prediction markets at the end of 2024, “there have been more than 2 billion contracts traded” on its platform.

-Aaron Rennie

Apple to Make US-Bound iPhone 17 in India, Report Says

3 hr 14 min ago

Apple (AAPL) is reportedly planning to make all four of the iPhone 17 models it will sell in the U.S. in India, the first time the company is making its latest lineup in the South Asian country.

The iPhone 17 is due to debut next month.

According to Bloomberg, citing people with knowledge of the matter, the tech giant is expanding its iPhone production in India at five factories, including two plants that were opened recently, and producing all four iPhone 17 models in the Asian nation.

The India expansion is part of Apple’s efforts to reduce its dependence on China for the phones it is selling in the U.S. While India faces an extra 25% levy for buying Russian oil on top of the 25% previously announced tariffs, consumer electronic imports into the U.S. are so far exempt from levies.

Apple shares have lost almost 8% of their value since the start of the year amid worries about its stalling progress in artificial intelligence and the hit from the Trump administration’s tariffs. They closed slightly lower on Tuesday.

-Nisha Gopalan

Palantir Plunges to Extend Week-Long Slump

3 hr 58 min ago

Palantir (PLTR) shares tumbled Tuesday afternoon, extending recent losses as a high-profile short seller fueled worries the stock could be overvalued after a strong run earlier this year. 

The shares were down 9% around $159 in recent trading. Still, they’ve more than doubled in value in 2025, leaving Palantir the top-performing stock in the S&P 500  for the year so far as demand for the data analytics software company’s Artificial Intelligence Platform drives record sales.

Short seller Andrew Left of Citron Research, who voiced concerns about the stock’s valuation in a Fox Business interview last Wednesday, said in a report yesterday that he believes the stock has become “detached from fundamentals” and would be worth $40.

The report compares Palantir to OpenAI, and posits that if Palantir were to trade at the same price-to-revenue multiple as the ChatGPT maker, given Bloomberg consensus projections, Palantir’s stock price would be closer to $40. However, “even that price would leave Palantir among the most expensive [software as a service] names in history,” Left said.

Left, whose sharp commentary and claimed track record of exposing fraud and overvaluation have earned him the moniker “The Bounty Hunter of Wall Street,” has become a controversial figure and faces criminal charges for securities fraud.

Still, he’s not the only one who’s raised concerns about Palantir’s lofty valuation. Of the eight Wall Street analysts with current ratings surveyed by Visible Alpha, just two have issued “buy” recommendations versus six “hold” ratings, amid some concerns the stock may have climbed too high, too fast, and could be due for a drawback.

Jefferies analysts, who applauded Palantir’s strong revenue growth and outlook after the company reported results earlier this month, said they still believe the stock’s valuation is “disconnected from even optimistic growth scenarios.” HSBC analysts, who have a neutral rating for the stock, also warned it might already be “priced for perfection” and could struggle to keep up with investors’ high expectations

-Kara Greenberg

Nvidia Considers New Products for China Market

4 hr 52 min ago

Nvidia (NVDA) said it’s considering a “variety of products” for its roadmap as more details emerge about a new AI chip for the Chinese market. This follows recent signs of inroads in winning approvals from the Trump administration to expand sales to the country. 

Nvidia could look to deliver samples of the new chip to Chinese clients for testing as early as next month, Reuters reported Tuesday.

 The new chip, tentatively known as the B30A, is based on Nvidia’s Blackwell architecture and more advanced than the H20 chip the company recently won approval to resume selling in China after striking a deal with President Trump to pay the U.S. government 15% of its China chip revenue. 

A Nvidia spokesperson told Investopedia Tuesday that the company wants to be “prepared to compete to the extent that governments allow,” adding “everything we offer is with the full approval of the applicable authorities and designed solely for beneficial commercial use.”

Shares of Nvidia were down 3% in recent trading. Still, they’ve added nearly a third of their value this year, after their recent rally amid optimism about the company’s sales in China and strong demand for AI hardware.

While many on Wall Street saw the recent 15% revenue-sharing agreements for Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) as a positive development for the companies—which took a hit on export curbs earlier in the year—some have raised concerns about what they could mean for American tech companies navigating rapidly changing China trade policies.

“It feels like a slippery slope to us,” Bernstein analysts wrote last week of the deals, which could open the door to others and pointed to a lack of clarity on whether and how much companies could be pushed to pay to sell such products in China. “Sure it might raise some money, but doesn’t seem to address any strategic issues beyond a grab for dollars,” the analysts said.

 Last week, Trump suggested he could be open to expanding Nvidia’s licenses to cover more powerful chips, after further negotiations. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang could be asked for more details on the company’s plans when the chipmaker reports its latest quarterly financial results after the bell Aug. 27.

-Kara Greenberg

Powell Speech Could Jolt Markets

5 hr 22 min ago

Fed Jerome Powell is slated to speak on Friday at the Fed’s annual gathering of central bankers in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and Evercore ISI warns that market participants might not love what he has to say. 

Powell “is likely to indirectly signal a 25bp rate cut” at the Fed’s next policy meeting in mid-September, argued Evercore analysts led by Julian Emanuel in a note on Sunday. “For a market that was eager to embrace ’50 in Sept,’” referring to market chatter about the likelihood officials would cut rates by 50 basis points, or half a percentage point, next month, “a balanced view could catalyze a near term -7% to -15% pullback into October.”

“The stakes … are high with both sides of the Dual Mandate muddled,” the analysts wrote, referring to the Fed’s job of balancing stable prices and maximum employment. 

Inflation data last week painted a muddy picture of how tariffs are affecting prices; the Consumer Price Index rose less than expected in July, while wholesale prices climbed much faster than forecast. 

Labor market data is not much clearer. Weekly initial unemployment claims have held steady this year. Meanwhile, job growth has fallen to its slowest 3-month pace (outside of the pandemic shock) since 2010, when the unemployment rate was about 9%, double what it is today.

President Donald Trump is adding to the uncertainty. Since returning to the White House in January, Trump has repeatedly criticized Powell, whom he appointed in 2019, and called on the Fed to lower rates. In early August, Trump fired the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics after a disappointing jobs report, alarming some economists concerned that political interference could skew official economic data. 

High stock prices and seasonal weakness are additional causes for concern, says Evercore. 

“Pedal to the metal equity market bullishness in August typically runs into the realities of September,” which is historically the worst month of the year for stocks, the analysts wrote. And Wall Street’s post-“Liberation Day” rally, fueled by trade deals and resilient corporate earnings, has stock valuations near their highest levels since the Dotcom Bubble. 

Against that backdrop, Evercore recommends investors hold a core portfolio of “AI Enablers, Adopters and Adapters” in the communication services, consumer discretionary, and tech sectors. Big names in the category include Amazon (AMZN), Alphabet (GOOG), and Micron (MU).2

They recommend supplementing those core holdings with attractively priced stocks with positive earnings revisions. They note healthcare companies, including Pfizer (PFE) and Cigna (CI), are overrepresented in the list of stocks that meet these criteria. They suggest funding those purchases by selling pricey stocks with less attractive earnings outlooks, including retail investor favorites like Palantir (PLTR), Tesla (TSLA), and Strategy (MSTR).

-Colin Laidley

Viking Therapeutics Plunges on Weight-Loss Pill Study

6 hr 22 min ago

Viking Therapeutics (VKTX) shares plummeted Tuesday after the biopharma firm reported a study of its experimental weight-loss pill raised concerns about side effects.

The company said a Phase 2 trial of its VK2735 tablet found that patients lost up to 12.2% of their mean body weight, or about 26.7 pounds, compared to a drop of 1.3% mean body weight, or 2.9 pounds, for those given a placebo.

However, overall 28% of those on VK2735 stopped taking it early, while only 18% of the placebo group did so. Viking said the most common reason for patients discontinuing the treatment was “gastrointestinal (GI)-related adverse events.”

CEO Brian Lian said in a call with analysts that the number of adverse effects were highest in the first week of the trial, and declined as it went on. He explained that “GI-related adverse event rates might be further reduced through lower starting doses and or slower dose escalation,” according to a transcript provided by AlphaSense. Lian added the company looks forward to “exploring this further in an upcoming maintenance dosing study.”

Viking Therapeutics shares were down 42% in recent trading. The stock came into today’s session up about 5% so far in 2025.

-Bill McColl

Best Buy Launches U.S. Digital Marketplace

7 hr 30 min ago

You can now go to Best Buy’s website for everything from a statue of Ganesh playing the flute to a set of champagne flutes.

Best Buy (BBY) doubled the number of products available through its website and app while launching a U.S. marketplace Tuesday that’s open to hundreds of brands not carried in its stores, such as Martha Stewart, Crock-Pot, and World Wide Stereo. The marketplace offers more technology and taps into new categories, including sports team merch, seasonal decorations, and musical instruments, as well as toys and puzzles, Best Buy said in a press release and Q&A.

“Our customers have always looked to us to bring excitement and inspiration in ways only technology can,” Frank Bedo, chief marketplace and eCommerce officer at Best Buy, said in a statement. Through the marketplace, “we can truly offer the full experience they need,” the statement said.

The electronics giant, which already has a third-party platform in Canada, is the latest retailer to launch an online marketplace—a move that allows companies to expand their product portfolio without investing in inventory or storage space. Walmart (WMT), Target (TGT), Lowe’s (LOW), Nordstrom, and Ulta (ULTA) have launched or shared plans to launch a marketplace, according to company announcements. Digital marketplaces are estimated to facilitate hundreds of billions of dollars in annual sales.

Shoppers can’t currently have marketplace purchases shipped to a store for pickup, but Best Buy locations will facilitate returns, a spokesman said.

Best Buy shares were up about 4% in recent trading but are down more than 12% for the year. In late May, the company reported mixed first-quarter results and lowered its full-year outlook because of tariffs.

-Sarina Trangle

Palo Alto Networks Shares Surge on Strong Earnings, Outlook

8 hr 40 min ago

Shares of Palo Alto Networks (PANW) jumped Tuesday, a day after the cybersecurity firm posted better-than-expected results and guidance as customers demanded increasingly powerful tools to fight hackers.

The company reported fiscal 2025 fourth-quarter adjusted earnings per share of $0.95, with revenue up 16% year-over-year to $2.54 billion. Both exceeded estimates of analysts surveyed by Visible Alpha.

CEO Nikesh Arora said the performance “reflects a fundamental market shift in which customers understand that a fragmented defense is no defense at all against modern threats. They are partnering with us because our platforms are designed to work in concert, creating powerful operational synergies that deliver superior, near real-time outcomes and the efficiency our customers need.” 

Palo Alto Networks sees fiscal 2026 adjusted EPS of $3.75 to $3.85, and revenue of $10.475 billion to $10.525 billion. Visible Alpha forecasts were for $3.67 and $10.431 billion, respectively. Its current-quarter profit and revenue projections also topped estimates.

Along with the results, the company also announced that its founder, Nir Zuk, was retiring as Chief Technical Officer and stepping down as a member of the board. Zuk is being replaced by Chief Product Officer Lee Klarich in both positions.

Palo Alto shares were up 4.5% in recent trading, pushing the stock into positive territory for the year.

-Bill McColl

Home Depot Stock Jumps as Company Affirms Outlook

9 hr 21 min ago

Home Depot (HD) shares rose in early trading Tuesday after the biggest home-improvement retailer affirmed its guidance as do-it-yourself and large project demand increased.

The company reiterated its full-year outlook for sales rising about 2.8%, and comparable store sales growth of approximately 1.0%.

CEO Ted Decker said that the “momentum that began in the back half of last year continued throughout the first half as customers engaged more broadly in smaller home improvement projects.” In an interview, CFO Richard McPhail noted that the company saw comparable sales increase every month in the quarter.

The comments came as Home Depot reported mixed second-quarter results. Sales gained 4.9% year-over-year to $45.28 billion, a tad higher than estimates of analysts surveyed by Visible Alpha. Adjusted earnings per share of $4.68 narrowly missed forecasts.

Comparable store sales were 1.0% higher, and while that was a tick below expectations, it was well above last year’s decline of 3.3%. Comparable average tickets advanced 1.4%, compared to a drop of 1.3% in 2024. 

Home Depot shares were up about 4% in recent trading.

-Bill McColl

Intel Jumps as SoftBank to Invest $2 Billion

9 hr 50 min ago

Intel (INTC) shares surged in early trading Tuesday on news that Japan’s SoftBank Group is making a $2 billion investment in the struggling U.S. chipmaker.

SoftBank will pay $23 for each Intel share, a slight discount to Monday’s closing price of $23.66, the companies announced.

“This strategic investment reflects our belief that advanced semiconductor manufacturing and supply will further expand in the United States, with Intel playing a critical role,” said SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son, who last December announced plans for the firm to invest around $100 billion in the U.S. with President-elect Donald Trump.

Last week, Bloomberg reported that the Trump administration was in talks to take a stake in the chipmaker, and yesterday reported the U.S. would buy around 10% of Intel by converting some or all of the company’s CHIPS and Science Act grants into equity. Such a stake would make the U.S. the embattled chipmaker’s biggest shareholder, the report said. The White House didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Last month, Intel’s second-quarter sales topped analysts’ estimates but the company unexpectedly swung to an adjusted loss and CEO Lip-Bu Tan announced layoffs in a memo to employees.

Intel shares were up more than 10% at around $26 in recent trading.

-Nisha Gopalan

Major Index Futures Little Changed

11 hr 23 min ago

Futures tied to the Dow Jones Industrial Average were up 0.1%.

S&P 500 futures slipped 0.1%.

Nasdaq 100 futures were also down 0.1%.