On Monday afternoon, the Nasdaq climbed 1.5%, adding 277 points, following President Joe Biden’s withdrawal from the presidential race and his endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris. The Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 also experienced gains, increasing by 0.3% and 1.1%, respectively.
The crypto-based betting platform Polymarket indicates that Harris is favored to be the Democratic nominee for president, while PredictIt, based in New Zealand, predicts she could become the 47th president of the United States.
In stock news, Nvidia shares rose by 4% after news emerged that the company is working on a version of its new Blackwell AI chips specifically for the Chinese market. Nvidia plans to partner with the local distributor Inspur to launch a chip, tentatively named the “B20,” which is expected to ship in the second quarter of 2025. Nvidia has not commented on the report.
Tesla’s stock increased by nearly 5% ahead of its anticipated earnings report, during which CEO Elon Musk is expected to comment on the delay of the company’s robotaxi rollout. Musk shared on X that Tesla would have operational humanoid robots for internal use next year and aims for broader production by 2026.
Meanwhile, CrowdStrike, which was involved in a significant global tech outage last week, continues to deal with the repercussions. The company reported that many of the 8.5 million Windows devices affected are now operational again, but its stock fell over 13%, trading around $263 on Monday afternoon.
Lastly, Verizon’s stock dropped nearly 6% following the release of its earnings report, which revealed that the company missed quarterly revenue estimates. This decline is attributed to a trend where customers are keeping older phones for longer, negatively affecting upgrade rates. Verizon’s second-quarter revenue was reported at $32.8 billion, slightly below the expected $33.06 billion, with earnings per share at $1.15, meeting predictions.