GREEN BAY, WISCONSIN - DECEMBER 07: Caleb Williams #18 of the Chicago Bears walks off the field after a loss to the Green Bay Packers at Lambeau Field on December 07, 2025 in Green Bay, Wisconsin. (Photo by John Fisher/Getty Images)

(John Fisher/Getty Images)

Stocks erase 2026 gains as tech and crypto continue to slide; volatility rises

Investors continued to shun risk amid rising volatility.

2/5/26 4:05PM

The S&P 500, Nasdaq 100, and Russell 2000 all fell on Thursday. The benchmark index is now officially negative for the year. The VIX, Wall Street’s fear gauge, climbed above 20. Every sector fell except for defensive sectors utilities and consumer staples.

Bitcoin set new cycle lows, and altcoins XRP, solana, dogecoin, and chainlink revisited levels not seen in several years. Silver also resumed its slide.

Stocks that moved higher:

Broadcom rose as it enjoyed a halo effect from Google’s plans to spend up to $185 billion on capex this year.
Arm Holdings rose after reporting solid results and a cheery outlook as investors appeared to shake off the implications of Qualcomm’s weak guidance.
Nio charged higher as the EV maker projected its first-ever quarterly profit in its fourth quarter.
Cigna rose as its Q4 results beat Wall Street estimates, though its 2026 guidance underwhelmed.

Stocks that moved lower:

Qualcomm tumbled after releasing gloomy Q2 guidance.
Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly dropped as Hims & Hers will offer copies of Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy pill at $49 a month for starting doses.
Retail favorites and high-beta momentum stocks took a dive, including Palantir, AST SpaceMobile, Rocket Lab, and quantum computing trades D-Wave Quantum and Rigetti Computing.
Snap slid despite reporting a surprise profit beat in yesterday’s Q4 earnings results, though its daily active users fell.
Despite reporting an earnings beat after the bell yesterday, investors reacted negatively Alphabet’s huge capex plans. Many analysts, however, raised their price targets.
e.l.f. Beauty dipped despite reporting a Q3 earnings beat after the bell yesterday.
Blue Owl Capital ticked lower despite reporting Q4 sales and earnings above estimates.
IonQ fell after Wolfpack Research released a short report alleging the company has lost funding for key Pentagon contracts.
Peloton plunged after reporting a greater-than-expected loss, lower-than-expected revenue, and falling subscription numbers in its Q2 earnings this morning.

Luke Kawa

14h

Leverage in the AI trade is even scarier than the debt used for its build-out

US stocks get the hiccups, Korean markets throw up, US stocks catch a fever.

Helena Cheng6/22/26

Google invests $75 million in film studio A24, forms AI partnership

Google is investing roughly $75 million in independent film studio A24 as part of an AI partnership, according the Wall Street Journal. The investment marks Google’s first direct stake in a film studio.

Under the agreement, A24 will work with Google DeepMind to develop and test AI tools for filmmaking and production workflows, the Journal reports.

The deal comes as A24 continues to expand its business beyond indie films into television, music, and live events. Since its 2013 launch, the studio has produced Oscar-winning films such as Everything Everywhere All at Once. Its revenue has more than doubled over the past two years, according to the Journal, and the company was last valued at $3.5 billion in a Thrive Capital-led funding round in 2024.

Google’s investment comes as major technology companies increasingly deepen ties with media companies as generative AI tools become more integrated into creative industries. For Google, the partnership also expands DeepMind’s reach into entertainment and film production.

The firm and TV industry is pushing to develop AI tools that can be integrated into the time-consuming and expensive production process. In a sign of the potential value of such tools, in March, Netflix announced it would acquire Ben Affleck's startup InterPositive, which is building AI film-making tools, for $600 million.

Helena Cheng6/22/26

Getty Images surges following OpenAI partnership

Getty Images is surging in early trading after the company announced a multi-year licensing and product partnership with OpenAI.

Under the agreement, OpenAI will license Getty’s library of images, videos, and metadata for use in training and improving its AI models, while Getty will integrate OpenAI’s generative AI tools into its own products and services.

The deal comes as Getty faces growing pressure from generative AI tools that can create stock image-like images in seconds, threatening parts of its traditional licensing business. Getty posted revenue of $226.6 million in Q1, down 2.5% year over year on a currency-neutral basis.

Getty was one of the earliest major content companies to challenge AI firms in court, suing Stability AI in 2023 for allegedly scraping millions of copyrighted images without permission to train image-generation models.

The OpenAI deal follows Getty’s 2025 licensing agreement with Perplexity, which gave the AI search company access to Getty’s library and required image credits with links to original sources.

Before the announcement, Getty shares had been trading below $1 for months. The stock surged by 124% in early trading, erasing its year-to-date losses as investors are waiting to see if Getty can turn its licensed content library into a more valuable AI asset.