S&P 500 Climbs on Cyclical Stocks as Nvidia and Alphabet Diverge Amid Fed Speculation

The S&P 500 rose 0.5% Thursday, fueled by cyclical stocks like financials and industrials, offsetting tech sector volatility. Nvidia's robust demand contrasted with Alphabet's sharp dip on regulatory concerns.

Cyclical Stocks Lead Market Gains Despite Tech Struggles
Even though tech was down as Google fell on regulatory worries, cyclical equities like financials and industrials drove the market higher as a whole, leading to a higher closing for the S&P 500 on Thursday.

At 4:00 p.m. At 2100 GMT (New York Time), the NASDAQ Composite increased by 0.04%, the S&P 500 index by 0.5%, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average by 461 points, representing a 1.1% gain, Investing.com shares.

Last week, initial claims for unemployment benefits dropped 6,000 to a seasonally adjusted 213,000, a surprisingly low number.

Federal Reserve policymakers have remained cautious about the rate-cut forecast, but there are signs that job gains are starting to recover following last month's unexpected slowdown due to hurricanes and worker strikes.

According to Goolsbee, "[i]f we look out over the next year or so, it feels to me like rates will end up a fair bit lower than where they are today" (in prepared remarks). The event took place on Thursday in Indianapolis, Ind., at the Central Indiana Corporate Partnership.

Nvidia Highlights Strong AI Demand Amid Supply Woes
After the tech giant beat expectations in the third quarter, Nvidia shares closed modestly higher. However, some traders were disappointed by its fourth-quarter revenue projection, hoping for a far bigger beat.

After guiding substantially larger year-on-year increases in sales for the previous three quarters, Nvidia's quarterly revenue growth was sharply slowed down in the revenue estimate.

While acknowledging strong demand for its advanced AI chips, Nvidia—which surpassed Apple to become the most valuable listed firm in the world—also noted supply challenges, particularly in its upcoming Blackwell series of next-generation AI chips.

The DoJ requested that Google sell its Chrome web browser as part of a series of remedies to limit the tech giant's monopoly in online search, and Alphabet Inc. Class A plummeted more than 4% as a result.

Starbucks Rises on China Business News
Aside from that, Bloomberg reported that Starbucks is mulling several options for its China business, including the sale of a stake, in an effort to revive sales under new CEO Brian Niccol. As a result, Starbucks stock increased by roughly 2%.

Following the announcement of fiscal third-quarter profits that exceeded expectations, Snowflake stock had a significant surge of almost 33%.

After reporting a yearly decline in third-quarter sales, Baidu, a Chinese internet behemoth, saw its stock price plummet 6%.