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S&P 500 closes at record as tech heavyweights flex (besides Apple)

The Magnificent 7 did the heavy lifting, performing better than any S&P 500 sector ETF on Tuesday.

9/9/25 4:09PM

The S&P 500 rose 0.3% to post a fresh record close thanks to most of the leading tech companies that have been key to its rally in recent years.

The Magnificent 7 did more than twice as well as the benchmark US stock index today, with Alphabet up more than 2% and Meta, Nvidia, and Amazon all up at least 1%. The sore thumb that stuck out: Apple shares fell 1.5% after the tech giant debuted an extra slim iPhone Air, iPhone Pro with longer battery life, updated AirPods Pro 3 with live language translation, and refreshed Apple Watch line at its annual event. It usually falls during these announcements.

The Nasdaq 100 also rose 0.3%, while the Russell 2000 fell 0.5%.

Materials were far and away the worst-performing S&P 500 sector ETF, while communications services and healthcare posted the biggest gains.

Gains on the day were led by UnitedHealth, which popped 8.7% after the health insurance giant said it expects most of its Medicare Advantage enrollees to be on more lucrative plans next year. Declines were led by Albemarle, which dropped 11.5% after reports that Chinese EV battery maker Contemporary Amperex Technology will restart its Yichun lithium mine.

Robinhood hit an all-time high as the brokerage company continues to rise after being tapped for inclusion in the blue-chip S&P 500 on Friday.

(Robinhood Markets Inc. is the parent company of Sherwood Media, an independently operated media company subject to certain legal and regulatory restrictions.)

Nebius surged nearly 50% after the artificial intelligence infrastructure group announced a major deal to supply computing power for Microsoft’s AI operations.

CoreWeave also leapt 7.1% as the news highlighted the immense value and continued demand across the AI data center ecosystem.

Planet Labs fell 6.6%, giving back some of Monday’s pop after the satellite operator (and retail favorite) posted better-than-expected quarterly numbers.

Fox and News Corp dropped 6.7% and 1.7%, respectively, after Rupert Murdoch’s heirs agreed to a $3.3 billion settlement to resolve a long-running succession drama.

Toby Bochan, Luke Kawa

Market Wrap

US stocks close at record highs on US-China trade truce optimism

The S&P 500, Nasdaq 100, and Russell 2000 all started off the week with record highs ahead of a big earnings week, with five of the members of the Magnificent 7 reporting.

Max Knoblauch7h

Bullish options flows boost Rivian

EV maker Rivian is up nearly 5% on Monday afternoon as bullish options flows lift the stock ahead of its third-quarter earnings, set to drop next week.

According to Bloomberg, Rivian call options traded outnumber put options more than five to one, for a put/call ratio of less than 0.2 as of 2:38 p.m. ET. That’s significantly less than the 20-day put/call average of 0.4. More than 116,000 call options have changed hands, more than 60% above the full-day average over the past 20 days.

Rivian’s upcoming earnings will measure the automaker’s sales ahead of the expiration of the $7,500 EV tax credit. Since September, Rivian has performed two rounds of layoffs as it seeks to cut costs amid the end of regulatory credits and ahead of next year’s lower-cost SUV launch.

Matt Phillips8h

Palantir inks defense deal with Poland, touches new intraday high

Palantir Technologies touched a new intraday high of $192.83 early Monday, as the company rode the China trade truce rally in AI tech stocks and retail favorites.

Palantir also signed a new deal to supply the government of Poland with data, AI, and cybersecurity software, according to Bloomberg.

Polish Minister of Defense Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz and Palantir CEO Alex Karp signed the letter of intent on the deal, about which few details were released. Polish officials did signal that they were interested in Palantir software systems for “battlefield management” and logistics. Up more than 150% this year, Palantir reports Q3 earnings on November 3.

Poland Signs Palantir, Anduril Deals Amid Record Army Spending

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Intellia tanks as it pauses late-stage CRISPR gene-editing trials after one patient was hospitalized

Intellia dropped sharply on Monday after it announced that it’s pausing two late-stage CRISPR gene-editing trials because one patient was hospitalized with liver damage.

Intellia had also disclosed in May that a patient had experienced elevated liver enzymes. The news is a major setback for the company, which currently has no products on the market and is working on a one-time treatment for heart and nerve conditions.

The news dragged down other companies working on CRISPR treatments, including Beam Therapeutics Inc, Crispr Therapeutics, Editas Medicine, and Prime Medicine.

Luke Kawa9h

Gold craters as retail traders pull money from commodity ETFs

As its fierce rally begins to fade, it looks like retail traders are waving au revoir to gold.

JPMorgan strategist Arun Jain noted that retail traders have pulled about $120 million from commodity ETFs as of 11 a.m. ET on Monday, a level that stands in the 0.4th percentile relative to its one-year average. The SPDR Gold Shares ETF is down 2.8% as of 11:53 a.m. ET after suffering its worst loss since April 2013 last Tuesday. That day, retail had pulled just $50 million from commodity ETFs by 11 a.m.

The five-session average daily flows into the product hit an all-time high of nearly $1.1 billion last Monday as gold and silver had effectively become the new meme stocks, displaying strong momentum and heavy options activity.