On Monday afternoon, the Nasdaq experienced a 1.5% increase, gaining 277 points, following President Joe Biden’s announcement to withdraw from the presidential race and endorse Vice President Kamala Harris. The Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 also witnessed gains of 0.3% and 1.1%, respectively.
In the realm of betting, the crypto-based platform Polymarket has favored Harris as the Democratic nominee for president, while PredictIt from New Zealand predicts she could become the 47th president of the United States.
Nvidia’s stock rose 4% after reports from Reuters suggested that the company is working on a version of its new Blackwell AI chips tailored for the Chinese market. The firm is set to partner with local distributor Inspur to launch the chip, currently referred to as the “B20,” with expected shipments starting in the second quarter of 2025. Nvidia has not made any official comments regarding this development.
Tesla’s stock jumped nearly 5% just before its upcoming earnings report, where CEO Elon Musk is anticipated to discuss the long-awaited unveiling of the company’s robotaxi. Musk shared on social media that Tesla expects to have usable humanoid robots in limited production for internal use next year, aiming for wider production to assist other firms by 2026.
In contrast, CrowdStrike, the cybersecurity company implicated in a recent global tech outage, reported that it is slowly recovering from the incident. Approximately 8.5 million Windows devices were affected, but many are reportedly back online. However, CrowdStrike’s stock fell over 13% on Monday afternoon, trading around $263.
Verizon’s stock took a hit, dropping nearly 6% after the release of its quarterly earnings report, which fell short of revenue expectations. The slowdown in smartphone upgrades, as customers choose to keep their old devices longer, has adversely affected the telecommunication company’s revenue streams. Verizon reported second-quarter revenue of $32.8 billion, slightly below the average analyst estimate of $33.06 billion, while its earnings per share matched expectations at $1.15.