Markets
Nia Warfield, Luke Kawa

S&P 500 goes nowhere with earnings season set to pick up steam

The S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 ended fractionally lower while the Russell 2000 fell 0.6% in a ho-hum end to the week.

Volatility seems to have gone on vacation for the summer. The S&P 500 has traded in a weekly range of less than 2% in each of the past three weeks, the first time it’s done that this year.

Utilities was the only S&P 500 sector ETF to end with a gain of more than 1%; energy, healthcare, and communications services were the biggest decliners.

Gains were led by Invesco, which jumped 15% after the investment management firm told the SEC that it’s seeking permission from owners of its Invesco QQQ Trust to change the fund structure. Elevance Health was among the decliners, falling 8% after disappointing Q2 results and signaling uncertainty around the future of ACA enrollment. Centene and Molina Healthcare also dropped 4% and 10%, respectively.

Charles Schwab shares rose about 3%, hitting a record high, after relentless retail trading activity throughout the tariff-infused volatile second quarter helped drive better-than-expected results.

Both Coinbase and Robinhood reached record highs after the House passed two critical crypto legislative bills focused on stablecoins and market structure oversight.

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

Shares of online real estate company Opendoor were up 36%, continuing its rally after call volumes set a new daily record for the fourth straight session, nearly eclipsing 1 million.

Tiny AI company Blaize jumped more than 50% after announcing a $120 million deal to deploy its platform in Asia “for smart city applications.”

Netflix shares fell 5% a day after reporting a Q2 beat and receiving a wave of analyst price target hikes, as investors reacted to the company’s warning that second-half margins would be lower than the first half.

Sarepta shares sank 36% after reports that the FDA plans to halt all shipments of the company’s top-selling drug following a second patient death link to its experimental gene therapy. 

Exxon shares fell 3.5% after rival Chevron won a ruling that gives the company access to one of the world’s fastest-growing offshore oil regions, allowing Chevron to close its $53 billion acquisition of Hess. Chevron shares dipped down less than 1%.

Talen Energy, a power provider for hire with a focus on selling juice to the booming AI data center industry, jumped nearly 25% after announcing the purchase of two gas-fired power plants.

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markets
Max Knoblauch

Paramount surges on bullish options activity, 1 day after $24 billion Gulf backing report

Paramount Skydance shares surged more than 9% shortly after markets opened on Tuesday, on pace for their best day since news that the company had emerged victorious in the Warner Bros. bidding war broke in late February.

The entertainment giant is being propelled by bullish options activity, with about 17,000 call options having changed hands as of 10:03 a.m. ET, already ahead of the 20-day average for a full session.

The market move comes a day after reports that three Gulf sovereign wealth funds would back Paramount’s offer for WBD to the tune of $24 billion. Those working on the deal don’t expect the Gulf funds’ involvement to spark any additional regulatory reviews.

markets
Matt Phillips

Intel rises on news it will join Elon Musk’s Terafab project

US chipmaking icon Intel announced that it’s joining Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s ambitious Terafab chipmaking project, sending the stock up early Tuesday.

As Sherwood News’ Rani Molla reported late last month:

“Terafab aims to bring all aspects of chip production — from design to fabrication to packaging — under one roof. Musk said the facility is intended to produce up to 1 terawatt of compute annually. The plant would manufacture inference chips for Tesla’s Robotaxis and Optimus robots, as well as custom AI chips for space-based applications, including solar-powered AI satellites. Morgan Stanley estimates the project could cost $35 billion to $45 billion in capital expenditure, likely shared between Tesla and SpaceX.”

That would be a healthy chunk of change for Intel to access, and could offer an opportunity to turn around both the finances and the narrative surrounding Intel’s struggling foundry chipmaking operations.

markets
Luke Kawa

US stock futures slump, oil jumps after Iranian media reports explosions on Kharg Island

Stocks returned to negative territory in premarket trading and oil futures jumped after Iranian state-sponsored media said that explosions were heard on Kharg Island.

The Mehr News Agency, which reported this at 6:25 a.m. ET, did not comment on the source of these explosions. Fox News reported that the US targeted military installations, and unintentionally hit a landing dock. Axios also reported that the strikes were intended to hit military targets, citing a US official.

The SPDR S&P 500 ETF turned from slightly positive to down about 0.5% in the wake of this report, and extended losses after President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social that “a whole civilization will die tonight.”

West Texas Intermediate crude oil futures traded about 3% higher to $116 per barrel after having previously been roughly flat.

Trump’s Tuesday morning post seemingly reaffirms his commitment to escalate attacks on Iran, including targets that can be considered war crimes, if the Strait of Hormuz is not reopened. His current deadline, which has previously been pushed back on multiple occasions, is 8 p.m. on Tuesday night.

On Sunday, the president’s Truth Social account posted that “Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran.”

Kharg Island handles roughly 90% of Iran’s crude exports. Strikes that reduce Iran’s ability to ship oil would further disrupt energy markets, which have been roiled by the war and the limited movement of tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, a key choke point. Initial US attacks on Kharg Island in March were said to have hit military sites rather than energy infrastructure.

markets
Claire Yubin Oh

Universal Music jumps on Pershing Square’s $64 billion merger proposal

Universal Music Group ADRs rose 11% in premarket trading on Tuesday after Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square Capital offered a deal to combine the world’s largest music company with Pershing Square SPARC Holdings, with the resulting new company listed on the New York Stock Exchange.

The proposed transaction purportedly values UMG at a 78% premium to its last closing price, with shareholders receiving €5.05 per share in cash, plus 0.77 shares of the new company for each share of Universal Music held, per Pershing Square’s statement released on Tuesday. Together, the offer estimates UMG to be worth €30.40 per share, or €50 billion ($64 billion) as a whole.

Proposing a corporate shake-up for the record label, Ackman said, “UMG’s stock price has languished due to a combination of issues that are unrelated to the performance of its music business and importantly, all of them can be addressed with this transaction.” According to Pershing Square, those issues include an underutilization of UMG’s balance sheet, uncertainty over what the Bolloré group will do with their 18% stake in the company, and a delay in the US listing of the business. UMG’s shares have slumped more than 30% in the last six months before this morning’s jump.

markets
Luke Kawa

Broadcom jumps after locking down Google as a customer for future generations of TPUs

Shares of Broadcom rose more than 3% in postmarket trading on Monday after its most important customer doubled down on the custom chip specialist’s ability to produce its most valuable commodity.

In a filing, Broadcom said that it entered into a long-term agreement with Google to supply future generations of TPUs (custom AI accelerator chips) as well as a supply assurance agreement for networking and other equipment “through up to 2031.”

Bernstein analyst Stacy Rasgon indicated that Broadcom’s investor relations team told him that Google’s long-term agreement “has revenue commitments that go along with it through the timeline.”

Gemini 3 launched to rave reviews in November. The model was trained on TPUs codeveloped by Broadcom and Google.

The same Monday filing showed that Broadcom, Google, and Anthropic expanded a partnership that will see the Claude developer access 3.5 gigawatts of AI compute capacity beginning in 2027, powered by the TPUs codesigned by the custom chip specialist and the search giant.

Bernstein’s Rasgon added that Broadcom’s team suggested these 3.5 gigawatts are “only part of a larger partnership over time.” He thinks Broadcom’s fiscal year 2027 guidance for AI revenues of $100 billion “is looking increasingly light” thanks to this news.

For what it’s worth, the enhanced pact with Anthropic hinges on the firm’s ability to afford AI compute. But based on the insane trajectory of its run-rate revenue, that may not be a big hurdle to clear.

“Broadcom’s expanded agreements with Google and Anthropic add rare multi-year visibility, reinforcing a $40-$50 billion AI revenue opportunity tied to Anthropic’s 3.5 gigawatt deployment starting in 2027, while building on the previously disclosed 1GW ($10 billion) starting in 2H,” wrote Bloomberg Intelligence analysts Kunjan Sobhani and Oscar Hernandez Tejada.

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