S&P 500, Nasdaq, Dow Futures Dip As Investors Step Back From AI And Tech With Nasdaq In Correction Territory — NVDA, AAPL, UBER, SOXX In Focus

• The S&P 500 ended Thursday 4.4% lower, the Nasdaq 100 fell 6.4%, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 3.4%.

• Apple Inc. raised $7.5 billion from its high-grade bond offering.

• iShares Semiconductor ETF was down more than 12% for its worst day since March 2020, when COVID struck.

U.S. stock indices ended lower on Thursday, with futures extending declines after hours as investors heavily sold off tech and chipmaker stocks amid concerns a Democratic win could derail the pace of data center and AI buildout, delaying capex recovery.

The S&P 500 ended Thursday 4.4% lower, the Nasdaq 100 fell 6.4%, well in correction territory, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 3.4%. The Russell 2000, which tracks small-cap stocks, lost 4.5%.

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S&P 500 futures lost 0.8%, while Nasdaq-100 futures slid 1.3%. Futures tied to the Dow Jones Industrial Average shed 264 points, or 0.5%.

The SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY) fell 4.5%, and the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF (DIA) dropped 3.5%. Meanwhile, the Nasdaq-100 tracking Invesco QQQ Trust (QQQ) ended 6.5% lower on Thursday.

Meanwhile, the VanEck Semiconductor ETF (SMH) and the iShares Semiconductor ETF dropped between 11% and 12% each on Thursday amid weakness in Nvidia (NVDA), Micron Tech (MU),Broadcom (AVGO) and memory chip maker SanDisk (SNDK). The broader Vanguard Information Technology ETF (VGT) dropped 5.8%.

Retail sentiment on Stocktwits for SPY, QQQ, and DIA was ‘bearish.’

US Market Drivers

The sudden acceleration in the tech selloff was heavily catalyzed by the outcome of Tuesday’s midterm elections, which saw Democrats capture majorities in both the Senate and the House of Representatives. Electoral campaigns increasingly centered around public pushback against massive data center developments, driven by community anxieties over escalating electricity costs, environmental strains, and grid reliability.

In Texas, newly elected Governor-elect Gina Hinojosa amplified these regional concerns by advocating for an immediate moratorium on new data center construction. Because data centers serve as the physical backbone for AI infrastructure—packed densely with rows of advanced semiconductors—any regulatory roadblock or deceleration in data center spending threatens to translate into severe long-term headwinds for chipmakers.