4:15pm: Rising yields pressure stocks
Stocks lost steam heading into the close on Friday, with the major averages pulling back from recent record highs as rising bond yields and renewed inflation worries weighed on sentiment ahead of next week’s closely watched earnings from Nvidia.
The Dow fell 426 points, or 0.9%, to 49,637, while the S&P 500 dropped 56 points, or 0.8%, to 7,445. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite shed 222 points, or 0.8%, to finish at 26,413.
Markets swung between gains and losses through the session as investors continued to assess the fallout from this week’s Trump-Xi summit in China, while also keeping a close eye on the bond market.
Treasury yields pushed higher, reviving concerns that sticky inflation could complicate the outlook for interest rates and equity valuations.
Energy stocks provided one of the few bright spots on the day. The Energy Select Sector SPDR Fund finished in positive territory as oil prices surged sharply. West Texas Intermediate crude climbed back above the $100-per-barrel mark, while Brent crude traded north of $109, fueling gains across the energy sector.
Despite the late-week selloff, the Dow still managed to briefly reclaim the 50,000 level earlier in the week for the first time in months, underscoring how resilient the broader market rally has been even as volatility picks up. Investors now turn their attention to next week’s earnings calendar, with Nvidia’s results expected to be a key test for the market’s AI-driven momentum.
3:40pm: Proactive news headlines
- Digi Power X Inc (NASDAQ:DGXX, FRA:1NQ0, NEO:DGX) said its NeoCloudz GPU-as-a-Service platform has begun generating initial revenue from NVIDIA GPU deployments in Alabama, marking a key step in the company’s expansion into AI infrastructure and colocation services.
- NanoViricides (NYSE-A:NNVC) announced a registered direct offering expected to raise about $2 million through the sale of common shares and accompanying warrants to a single institutional investor.
- New Era Energy & Digital (NASDAQ:NUAI) filed its quarterly report while highlighting financing and development milestones tied to its Texas Critical Data Center project as it shifts focus away from legacy oil and gas operations.
- Ideal Power Inc (NASDAQ:IPWR, FRA:5ILA) unveiled plans to raise about $30 million through a share offering to support commercialization and production ramp-up of its B-TRAN semiconductor technology for data center and industrial markets.
- 374Water Inc (NASDAQ:SCWO, FRA:8LL) reported first-quarter results showing improved gross margins, steady revenue growth and continued progress on municipal and federal PFAS waste treatment projects.
- Bit Digital Inc (NASDAQ:BTBT) reported first-quarter revenue of $27.9 million as the company accelerated its transition toward Ethereum treasury management and AI infrastructure through subsidiary WhiteFiber.
- Trust Stamp Inc (NASDAQ:IDAI, ISE:AIID) posted a 39% increase in first-quarter net recognized revenue driven by a contract amendment with an S&P 500 bank client and contributions expected from new customers in the second quarter.
- Medicus Pharma (NASDAQ:MDCX) highlighted positive clinical progress for its SkinJect and Teverelix programs in its first-quarter results while continuing efforts to strengthen its financial position.
2:40pm: Market movers
- Gemini Space Station (NASDAQ:GEMI) shares rose about 5% after the company reported first-quarter results that beat expectations on a smaller-than-expected loss and announced a new strategic investment highlighting expansion beyond crypto trading.
- POET Technologies Inc (TSX-V:PTK, NASDAQ:POET, FRA:RI4A) shares fell about 12% following weaker-than-expected first-quarter results and news of a $400 million registered direct offering involving the issuance of shares and warrants to a single institutional investor.
- Pershing Square Capital Management, led by Bill Ackman, disclosed a new position in Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT) ahead of its 13F filing, citing opportunities to buy dominant long-term compounders at attractive valuations amid shifting market dynamics.
1:30pm: A sea of red
Stocks are under pressure across global markets as concerns grow over the potential economic fallout from a prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz, according to Axel Rudolph, Chief Technical Analyst at IG.
Investors were met with “a sea of red” on the final trading day of the week, Rudolph noted, with equities sliding as yields and energy prices pushed higher.
Oil, in particular, is on track for a weekly gain of more than 5%, adding to the uneasy tone across markets.
"Heightened concerns of a prolonged shut down of the Strait of Hormuz following President Trump's blasé comments on the matter also pushed the US 10-year Treasury yield to a one-year high at 4.57%," said Rudolph.
"US industrial output growth rising to a 14-month high and New York manufacturing activity increasing the most in over four years helped stem the flow late in the day."
12:05pm: Ackman buys Microsoft
Bill Ackman said his hedge fund, Pershing Square Capital Management, has initiated a new position in Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT), according to a post on the social media platform X ahead of an upcoming 13F filing.
“As two of the largest forces in equity markets -- growing index ownership and increasing amounts of capital controlled by extremely short-term-oriented, leveraged, volatility-intolerant investors -- converge, we have found occasional opportunities to acquire some of the most dominant long-term compounding franchises at attractive valuations,” Ackman wrote.
He added that his firm has previously built positions in major technology companies during periods of market volatility, including Alphabet, Amazon and Meta.
Shares of Microsoft, which has not publicly commented on the investment, traded up 3% at $422 on Friday morning.
11:10am: Huang in tug-of-war
Wedbush’s Dan Ives said Nvidia received a boost after the US approved sales of its H200 AI chips to 10 Chinese companies, calling it a fresh catalyst for the chip and tech rally.
Ives believes Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang remains central to US-China tech tensions between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping.
The move highlights ongoing export controls since 2022, while China continues accelerating domestic AI and semiconductor development to reduce reliance on Nvidia supply chain.
"That tug of war is the core issue and while this is an inflection point moment for Nvidia and the AI Revolution as the broader technology complex stand to benefit with adjacent beneficiaries in networking, cloud infrastructure, and AI software in our view," Ives wrote Friday.
10:00am: Wall Street turns risk-off
Wall Street opened sharply lower on Friday, with investors pulling back from record highs as a mix of geopolitical tension, fresh AI-sector headlines and lingering uncertainty around US-China trade promises weighed on sentiment.
The Nasdaq dropped 441 points, or 1.7%, to 26,194 in early trading, while the S&P 500 fell 85 points, or 1.1%, to 7,416. The Dow Jones slid 431 points, or 0.9%, to 49,633.
Oil prices moved higher after US President Trump said he was losing patience with Iran and claimed China’s President Xi Jinping agreed Tehran cannot be allowed to obtain nuclear weapons, adding another layer of geopolitical risk to an already cautious market backdrop.
Despite recent optimism surrounding talks between Washington and Beijing, some analysts warned markets may be getting ahead of themselves.
“The headlines sound reassuring, but the substance underneath them remains remarkably thin,” said Nigel Green, CEO of deVere Group.
Trump claimed China would purchase 200 Boeing aircraft along with significantly larger volumes of US agricultural and energy exports, but Green noted that Beijing has yet to publicly release a formal agreement, timeline or financial framework.
“Global investors are being asked to price optimism without documentation,” Green said. “Aviation orders, agricultural commitments, and trade pledges only matter if there’s enforceable detail attached to them. Right now, there’s very little of that.”
Technology stocks were also in focus after reports that OpenAI is exploring legal action against Apple over the companies’ agreement to integrate ChatGPT into the iPhone ecosystem. Meanwhile, AI startup Anthropic reportedly agreed to terms on a massive fundraising round that would value the company at $900 billion, underscoring the extraordinary investor appetite still surrounding artificial intelligence.
Elsewhere in tech, billionaire investor Bill Ackman disclosed that his Pershing Square Capital Management fund has taken a new stake in Microsoft following the recent pullback in the software giant’s shares.
Investors are also looking ahead to a fresh batch of economic data later Friday, including the Empire State Manufacturing survey for May, followed by industrial production and capacity utilization data for April.
8am: Stocks set for pullback
US stock futures are pointing to a softer open on Friday, with investors taking a step back after a barnstorming session on Thursday that saw both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq close at fresh record highs and the Dow Jones reclaim the psychologically important 50,000 mark.
Dow Jones futures are down 0.5%, S&P 500 futures have slipped 0.9%, and Nasdaq 100 futures are off 1.3%.
The Dow and S&P 500 both climbed 0.8% on Thursday, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq gained 0.9%, ending the session at 26,635 as enthusiasm around artificial intelligence stocks roared back into the market.
The rally was led by Cisco, which surged over 13% after raising its revenue and earnings guidance, while Nvidia added 4.4% as the US approved H200 chip shipments to ten Chinese companies.
The news came at the culmination of President Donald Trump's state visit to Beijing, which generated considerable fanfare but appears to have achieved relatively little of substance. While the chip approval offered a sliver of good news, broader trade tensions remain unresolved, and markets are not expecting a transformational breakthrough to emerge from the summit.
The geopolitical backdrop is otherwise uncomfortable. Trump's warning that the Strait of Hormuz situation could prompt renewed military action has sent oil prices higher, adding to the inflationary pressure already evident in this week's data. Both US consumer and producer price indices came in well above expectations, with monthly PPI surging 1.4% against a forecast of 0.4%. That has driven the probability of a Federal Reserve rate hike to around 45%, double the level of just days ago, and sharply reduced expectations of any cuts in 2026.
US Treasury yields are rising in tandem with gilts and Japanese government bonds, with finance ministers from the G7 set to discuss the synchronised bond market selloff at their meeting in Paris on Monday and Tuesday.