Disney is currently on the lookout for a replacement for Bob Iger, with an executive from Morgan Stanley leading the search process.
In market news, the Nasdaq Composite experienced a significant boost of 1.5%, adding 277 points by Monday afternoon. This surge followed President Joe Biden’s announcement on Sunday that he would withdraw from the presidential race and endorse Vice President Kamala Harris. Concurrently, the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 saw gains of 0.3% and 1.1%, respectively.
In the realm of politics, the crypto-based betting platform Polymarket is backing Harris as the Democratic nominee for president, while PredictIt, based in New Zealand, forecasts that she will become the 47th president of the United States.
Nvidia’s stock rose by 4% in the afternoon after reports emerged that the company is creating a version of its new Blackwell AI chips specifically for China. Nvidia plans to collaborate with local partner Inspur to launch and distribute the chip, known as the “B20,” expected to ship in the second quarter of 2025. Nvidia has not commented publicly on the matter.
Tesla’s shares climbed nearly 5% ahead of its earnings report, with Elon Musk anticipated to share updates about the delayed unveiling of the company’s robotaxi. Musk stated on X that Tesla is set to have functional humanoid robots for internal use next year, and aims for mass production for other companies by 2026.
Meanwhile, CrowdStrike, the cybersecurity firm linked to a significant global tech outage last week, continues to address the residual effects. The company reported that many of the approximately 8.5 million affected Windows devices are now back online. However, on Monday afternoon, CrowdStrike’s stock plummeted over 13%, trading at around $263.
In other news, Verizon’s stock dropped nearly 6% in the afternoon after the release of its quarterly earnings report. The telecommunications provider fell short of revenue expectations, primarily due to customers retaining their old phones longer, which has adversely affected upgrade rates associated with new promotional plans. Verizon reported second-quarter revenues of $32.8 billion, slightly below the analysts’ average forecast of $33.06 billion, with earnings per share (EPS) matching expectations at $1.15.