Stock market today: Dow, S&P 500, Nasdaq waver as Wall Street cements in rate-cut hopes

Meta (META) led Big Tech stocks higher on Thursday morning. The Facebook parent climbed nearly 4% amid a report from Bloomberg that it’s planning a sharp pullback from its money-losing metaverse endeavors.

Nvidia (NVDA), Microsoft (MSFT) and Broadcom (AVGO) saw fractional gains. The three had fallen to varying degrees Wednesday after The Information reported that Microsoft was cutting its sales quotas for its newer AI products, reigniting investors doubt over AI demand amid ongoing fears of a market bubble.

Meanwhile, Apple (AAPL), Alphabet (GOOGL), and Amazon (AMZN) shares fell.

Netflix (NFLX) shares fell more than 1% Thursday, extending the previous session’s decline as CNBC reported that the streaming giant is the leading bidder for Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD), ahead of Paramount Skydance (PSKY) and Comcast (CMCSA).

Netflix is only interested in WBD’s studios and HBO Max Streaming Services, per Bloomberg.

The company argued argued Wednesday that bundling the its own offerings with HBO would help lower costs for consumers in a report from Reuters, attempting to preempt regulatory concerns over the potential acquisition. The report had the opposite effect, however, and sent the stock down 5% during yesterday’s trading session.

US stocks nudged higher at the market open on Thursday as labor market data helped further cement bets for a December rate cut.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) and the S&P 500 (^GSPC) added around 0.2%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) hovered above the flat line.

The moves come on the heels of modest gains for stocks on Wednesday.

Meta (META) stock jumped by over 5% after the opening bell on Thursday after Bloomberg reported that CEO Mark Zuckerberg is planning to cut up to 30% of its budget for metaverse efforts.

The proposed budget cuts, being discussed as part of the company’s annual budget planning, would likely include layoffs and affect its virtual reality game, Meta Horizon Worlds, and its Quest VR headset, according to people familiar with the matter.

Zuckerberg pivoted the social media company to focus on the metaverse in 2021 as the company faced criticism over its content moderation and privacy practices, even renaming the company to reflect its bet on the technology.

But many on Wall Street weren’t keen on the move — or the billions of dollars Meta diverted toward the effort.

Still, Meta has shown it’s still making a push to become a hardware company, diversifying beyond its apps. On Wednesday, reports surfaced that Meta poached Apple’s head of user interface design, Alan Dye, signaling its focus on AI-enabled consumer devices.

Kroger (KR) stock fell about 3% in premarket trading after the food retailer reported little revenue growth year over year.

The Cincinnati-based grocery chain posted adjusted earnings per share of $1.05, slightly beating Wall Street analysts’ expectations of $1.03 earnings per share, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence.

However, third quarter revenue of $33.9 billion was roughly unchanged from the same period a year ago, $33.6 billion, and missed analyst estimates of $34.1 billion. Same-store sales, excluding fuel, grew 2.6% year over year.

Kroger expects same-store sales ex-fuel to grow 2.8%-3.0%, narrower than its previous range of 2.7%-3.4%. The company also raised the lower end of its EPS guidance to $4.75-$4.80 from $4.70-$4.80 previously.

In a Nov. 25 note, JPMorgan analysts noted that the consumer and competitive environment has grown notably tougher for food retailers.

“Sentiment toward food retailers seems to have soured a bit over the past few months, including for [Kroger],” the analysts wrote. “When inflationary concerns were more persistent in the food space and the consumer environment was stronger, the food retail space was better liked.”

The analysts noted a few factors putting pressure on Kroger shares, in particular, in recent months: Amazon’s (AMZN) push into grocery, Walmart (WMT) taking share in grocery and ramping up price competition, concerns about food inflation reigniting, and Nielsen data showing slower sales growth.

Read more live coverage of corporate earnings here.

Yahoo Finance’s Hamza Shaban writes:

Read more here in the takeaway from today’s Morning Brief.

Economic data: Challenger job cuts (November); Initial jobless claims (week ended Nov. 29); Continuing claims (week ended Nov. 22)

Earnings: Toronto-Dominion Bank (TD), Bank of Montreal (BMO), Kroger (KR), Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE), Ulta Beauty (ULTA), Dollar General (DG), Samsara (IOT), The Cooper Companies (COO), DocuSign (DOCU), Brown-Forman Corporation (BF-A, BF-B), Rubrik (RBRK)

Here are some of the biggest stories you may have missed overnight and early this morning:

Companies make 71,000 layoffs in worst November since 2022

‘K-shaped’ economy has Wall Street on edge. Why it may be OK.

Bitcoin heads into 2026 with renewed acceptance — and volatility

Trump meets Nvidia’s CEO to talk AI chip curbs: Source

Market doubts Hassett can deliver at Fed: Top fund manager

Silver retreats from record high as traders lock in profits

Goldman: Copper’s ‘breakout’ above $11,000 won’t last

Alphabet’s AI chips are a potential $900B ‘secret sauce’

Meta hit by EU antitrust probe into AI use in WhatsApp

Wall Street shifts AI narrative from ‘bubble’ to ‘air pocket’

Mark Cuban urges Trump to cut fees holding back US generics

Yahoo Finance’s Allie Canal reports:

Read more here.

UiPath (PATH) stock rose 9% during premarket hours on Thursday after the software company reported a quarterly profit in its third quarter earnings.

Hormel Foods (HRL) stock rose 6% before the bell on Thursday after reporting higher sales in its fourth quarter. The company swung to a loss as profits remained under pressure amid ongoing inflation.

PayPal (PYPL) stock fell more than 1% in premarket trading after the company said it expects growth in its key branded checkout service to slow in the fourth quarter.

Salesforce (CRM) stock took a leg higher in premarket on the company’s third quarter earnings beat and improved outlook.

The software giant reported third quarter diluted earnings per share of $3.25, beating estimates of $2.58 per share, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence.

Revenue of $10.27 billion rose 8.6% year over year and was roughly in line with estimates.

Reuters reports:

Read more here.

Five Below (FIVE) shares rose early on Thursday as it became the latest value retailer to benefit from consumers’ shift toward more value-oriented purchases, as high-income shoppers drive traffic at dollar stores and other bargain outlets.

“We’ve seen really nice traffic growth and growth in both new customers as well as retention,” Five Below CEO Winnie Park said on the company’s earnings call. “What’s really worked in terms of growth is an expansion of the idea of what value looks like. We still curate a great assortment — roughly 80% of the assortment is $5 and below — but we took a lot of attention to those items above $5 and specifically packing a ton of value at $7, $10, $15.”

Net sales increased 23.1% year over year to $1 billion in the third quarter, surpassing estimates of $983 million, per S&P Global Market Intelligence. Same-store sales rose by 12.4% year over year.

Earnings per share reached $0.66, beating estimates for $0.26 per share, sending the stock 4% higher in after-hours trading.

Five Below also raised its full-year sales outlook to a range of $4.62 billion to $4.65 billion. The company also raised its forecast for diluted income per share to a range of $5.51 to $5.69 from $4.56 to $4.96 previously.

For the fourth quarter, net sales are expected to be in the range of $1.58 billion to $1.61 billion.

The Financial Times reports:

Bond investors have told the US Treasury they are concerned about Kevin Hassett’s potential appointment as Federal Reserve chair, worrying he will cut interest rates aggressively to please President Donald Trump.

The Treasury department solicited feedback on Hassett and other candidates in one-on-one conversations with executives at major Wall Street banks, asset management giants and other big players in the US debt market, according to several people familiar with the conversations.

… The doubts among market participants about Hassett reflect a broader anxiety on Wall Street about the transition at the Fed’s helm as Trump prepares to nominate a new leader of the central bank. Some senior bond market participants would have preferred other candidates such as BlackRock’s Rick Rieder and Fed governor Christopher Waller who were seen as more independent from Trump than Hassett.

Several of the market participants the Treasury contacted said they were worried about Hassett’s alignment with Trump, who has insisted rates should be cut sharply and has called Powell a “stubborn mule” for the central bank’s decision to only modestly lower borrowing costs this year.

Read more here (premium)

Snowflake (SNOW) stock tumbled after the AI data cloud provider reported a narrower-than-expected loss but issued guidance that fell short of the Street’s estimates. The company also announced it expanded its partnership with Anthropic (ANTH.PVT).

Snowflake shares fell 8% in pre-market trading on Thursday.

The Montana-based company reported on Wednesday that revenue grew 29% year over year to $1.15 billion during the quarter, slightly missing Wall Street’s estimates of $1.18 billion, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence. Snowflake reported a net loss per share of $0.87, a smaller loss than the $0.96 per share analysts were expecting.

For the fourth quarter, Snowflake guided for product revenue between $1.19 billion and $1.2 billion, which was slightly below the midpoint revenue forecast by the Street of $1.23 billion. The full-year revenue guidance of $4.44 billion also fell below expectations of $4.6 billion.

Snowflake also announced a multiyear, $200 million agreement with Anthropic that will make Anthropic’s Claude AI models available on the Snowflake platform and establish a joint venture to deploy AI agents across the world’s largest enterprises.

The deal deepens Snowflake’s relationship with Anthropic, as the company has already processed trillions of Claude tokens on its platform.

“Enterprises have spent years building secure, trusted data environments, and now they want AI that can work within those environments without compromise,” Anthropic CEO and co-founder Dario Amodei said in a statement. “This partnership brings Claude directly into Snowflake, where that data already lives. It’s a meaningful step toward making frontier AI genuinely useful for businesses.”

Reuters reports:

Read more here.

Bloomberg reports:

Oil held a gain as investors weighed the outlook for a ceasefire in Ukraine and the fallout from tensions between the US and Venezuela.

Brent (BZ=F) traded below $63 a barrel after climbing 0.4% on Wednesday, while West Texas Intermediate (CL=F) was near $59. US President Donald Trump said a meeting between his envoy and President Vladimir Putin was “reasonably good” but acknowledged the outcome for a peace deal was uncertain.

Separately, Trump reiterated the US will start striking drug cartels on land in Venezuela very soon. American forces have been massing in the region, with the situation adding some risk premium to oil prices, partially offsetting concerns around a surplus that’s expected to swell to a record next year.

Read more here.