U.S. Stocks suffered significant declines on Thursday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average closing down 669 points, a drop of 1.3%. The Nasdaq Composite fell by 2.03%, and the S&P 500 lost 1.57%, according to multiple reports.
The Dow erased a prior intraday gain of as much as 325 points, ultimately finishing the session at 49,451. The Nasdaq closed at 22,597, and the S&P 500 ended at 6,832. The sell-off was driven by renewed investor concerns regarding technology stocks, according to AASTOCKS.com and Hong Kong’s iNews.
Cisco Systems (CSCO.US) experienced a substantial 12.3% decline after reporting quarterly results that, while exceeding expectations, included a weaker-than-anticipated forecast for gross margins. This downturn led the losses on the Dow, as reported by both Yahoo Finance and AASTOCKS.com.
Major technology companies faced broad selling pressure. Apple (AAPL.US) shares fell by 5%, while Meta (META.US) and Amazon (AMZN.US) each declined by more than 2%. Nvidia (NVDA.US) decreased by 1.6%, and Microsoft (MSFT.US) saw a smaller drop of less than 1%, according to AASTOCKS.com.
Defensive stocks offered a counterpoint to the broader market trend, with Walmart (WMT.US) and Costco (COST.US) rising by 3.8% and 2.1% respectively.
The market downturn occurred ahead of the release of U.S. Consumer price index (CPI) data on Friday, as noted by iNews. Trading volume increased as investors positioned themselves ahead of the economic report.
In addition to stock declines, silver prices plunged 11% and gold prices fell by over 3%, according to iNews. The price of gold briefly dropped to $4,935 per ounce.
Micron Technology (MU) saw a more volatile session. After CFO Mehdi Hosseini clarified concerns about its product supply chain, stating that the company has begun mass production of HBM4 and that its HBM supply for the year is sold out, the stock initially surged, but ultimately closed up only 0.9% after a 6.9% intraday high, as reported by iNews.
Nebius (NBIS), a cloud service provider, experienced a mixed reaction to its quarterly earnings. While revenue increased more than fivefold year-over-year, it fell short of market expectations, leading to an initial drop of nearly 10% before a partial recovery to close up 1.3%, according to iNews.
Morgan Stanley subsequently raised its price target for Micron from $350 to $450, citing significant increases in storage chip prices and supply shortages across all complete markets since the company’s last earnings guidance, as reported by iNews.