The Nasdaq index rose by 1.5%, gaining 277 points on Monday afternoon, following President Joe Biden’s announcement that he would withdraw from the presidential race and endorse Vice President Kamala Harris. Meanwhile, the Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 saw modest increases of 0.3% and 1.1%, respectively.
In political predictions, the crypto-based betting platform Polymarket has backed Harris as the Democratic nominee, while PredictIt, based in New Zealand, forecasts she will be the 47th president of the United States.
In tech news, Nvidia’s shares climbed by 4% after reports emerged that the company is preparing a version of its Blackwell AI chips specifically for the Chinese market. Nvidia will collaborate with local partner Inspur to introduce the chip, tentatively named the “B20,” expected to be shipped by the second quarter of 2025. The company has opted not to comment on this development.
Tesla’s stock jumped by nearly 5% a day before it releases its earnings report, during which CEO Elon Musk is anticipated to share updates on the long-awaited robotaxi project. Musk shared on X that Tesla plans to have useful humanoid robots in limited production for internal purposes by next year, with hopes of increased production for external companies by 2026.
In contrast, CrowdStrike, the cybersecurity firm responsible for the recent major global tech outage, is still facing challenges as it works to resolve the aftermath. The company reported that a substantial number of the approximately 8.5 million impacted Windows devices are coming back online. However, its stock fell over 13% Monday afternoon, trading around $263.
Verizon experienced a nearly 6% decline in its stock following the release of its quarterly earnings report, which showed the company missing revenue estimates. The decrease in customers upgrading to new phones has negatively affected telecom upgrade rates. Verizon’s second-quarter revenue totaled $32.8 billion, slightly below analysts’ expectations of $33.06 billion, while earnings per share matched estimates at $1.15.