The Nasdaq 100 went nowhere, the S&P 500 eked out a small gain, and the Russell 2000 quietly rallied 1.4% as small-caps caught a bid.
President Donald Trump kept the Iran story front and center, saying that European leaders should stop “interfering with those that are getting rid of the Iran Nuclear threat” and doubling down on the U.S. naval blockade that has left Tehran’s energy exports collapsing. The standoff continued to bite physical oil flows.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rocketed 731 points or 1.5% to 49,593, pushed there by Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE:CAT) jumping 10% on a sharp earnings beat and financials.
Within Magnificent Seven stocks, the dispersion was extreme. Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) surged 6.5% to $372.85 on what management framed as a wave of enterprise AI client wins, while Meta Platforms Inc. cratered 9.1% to $608.08 after telegraphing another step-up in AI capex that investors fear is racing ahead of monetization.
Microsoft Corp. dropped 5% to $403.45 despite meeting AI and cloud consensus, Nvidia Corp. (NASDAQ:NVDA) fell 4.3% to $200.18 on the same capex skepticism, and Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) slipped 1.8% after a strong AWS print failed to overcome the broader hyperscaler funk.
The SPDR Gold Shares (NYSE:GLD) tracked spot gold higher, with the metal climbing 1.5% to $4,615 per ounce as some haven demand flowed back as the dollar fell.
The 10-year yield fell 4 basis points to 4.40% after testing nine-month highs at 4.45% in the previous session. The 2-year slipped 7 basis points to 3.90% and the 30-year eased 2 basis ...
