On Monday afternoon, the Nasdaq saw a rise of 1.5%, gaining 277 points. This increase followed President Joe Biden’s announcement on Sunday that he would not seek re-election, along with his endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris. Meanwhile, the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 also posted gains, adding 0.3% and 1.1% respectively.
In a related political forecast, the betting platform Polymarket has Harris as the leading candidate for the Democratic nomination for president, while New Zealand’s PredictIt anticipates she will become the 47th president of the United States.
In the tech sector, shares of Nvidia surged by 4% after reports surfaced that the company is developing a new version of its Blackwell AI chips tailored for the Chinese market. Nvidia is believed to be collaborating with local partner Inspur to introduce the chip, tentatively named the “B20,” expected to start shipping in the second quarter of 2025. Nvidia has refrained from commenting on this matter.
Furthermore, Tesla’s stock experienced a nearly 5% increase a day before its earnings report, where CEO Elon Musk is expected to address delays in the unveiling of the company’s robotaxi. Musk stated that Tesla aims to have operational humanoid robots in low production for internal use next year, with hopes for broader production by 2026.
On the other hand, CrowdStrike, the cybersecurity firm involved in a significant global tech outage, has been facing ongoing challenges. They reported that of the 8.5 million affected Windows devices, many have since returned to functionality. However, CrowdStrike’s stock fell over 13% on Monday, trading around $263.
Verizon faced a considerable decline of nearly 6% following the release of its quarterly earnings report. The company missed revenue expectations, attributing the shortfall to customers retaining their older phones longer, thereby reducing upgrade rates. Verizon’s second-quarter revenue came in at $32.8 billion, slightly lower than the anticipated $33.06 billion, with earnings per share (EPS) meeting expectations at $1.15.