On Monday afternoon, the Nasdaq Composite climbed by 1.5%, adding 277 points, following President Joe Biden’s announcement of his withdrawal from the presidential race and his endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris. Meanwhile, both the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 saw modest gains of 0.3% and 1.1%, respectively.
The crypto-based betting platform Polymarket has backed Harris as the Democratic nominee, while PredictIt from New Zealand forecasts that she will become the 47th president of the United States.
In other market news, Nvidia shares surged by 4% after reports emerged that the company is working on a new version of its Blackwell AI chips tailored for the Chinese market. The chipmaker plans to collaborate with local partner Inspur to launch the chip, referred to as the “B20,” which is anticipated to begin shipping in the second quarter of 2025. Nvidia has not commented on this development.
Tesla’s stock jumped nearly 5% ahead of its earnings report, with CEO Elon Musk expected to address the delay in the company’s robotaxi launch. Musk mentioned on social media that Tesla will have “genuinely useful humanoid robots” in low production for internal use next year and aims for higher production for other companies by 2026.
On the downside, shares of CrowdStrike, the cybersecurity firm responsible for Friday’s significant global tech disruption, continued to struggle, dropping over 13% to around $263. The company reported that a notable number of the approximately 8.5 million impacted Windows devices are now operational again.
Verizon experienced a nearly 6% decline in its stock price after announcing disappointing quarterly earnings. The telecommunications giant missed revenue expectations, attributed to customers retaining their old phones longer, which has negatively affected upgrade rates amidst offers for new mobile plans. Verizon reported second-quarter revenue of $32.8 billion, just under analysts’ forecasts of $33.06 billion, with earnings per share matching estimates at $1.15.