Stocks Rebound, Chipmakers Halt Bloodbath As Traders Upgrade Rate Cut Wagers; Tesla Rises, Dollar Tree In Free Fall: What's Driving Markets Wednesday?

Zinger Key Points
  • Wall Street edges higher after Tuesday's sell-off as Fed rate cut expectations rose.
  • July labor data confirmed a cooling job market, as job openings hit a three-year low.

Wall Street traded slightly higher on Wednesday, rebounding after the sharp sell-off a day earlier that saw chipmakers tumble, with NVIDIA Corp. NVDA shedding around $280 billion in market value — the largest single-day drop in history.

Investors processed fresh insights from July labor market statistics, which confirmed cooling conditions as job openings fell to their lowest level in three years, almost closing the gap with unemployment levels.

Expectations for a Federal Reserve interest rate cut improved, with market participants now assigning a 43% implied probability of a 50-basis-point cut in September, up from 38% the previous day.

Attention now shifts to key August labor data, with the ADP private payrolls report due Thursday, followed by the official jobs report on Friday.

Major equity indices were up marginally, while bonds outperformed, with the iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF TLT rising 0.7%, adding to Tuesday’s 1.3% gain.

Notably, chipmakers, as tracked by the iShares Semiconductor ETF SOXX, rose 1%.

The U.S. dollar weakened, losing 0.4% as falling Treasury yields weighed on the currency. Gold inched up 0.2%, set to break a three-day losing streak.

Oil prices continued to decline, falling 0.7% despite OPEC+ announcing a delay in its planned production increases.

Meanwhile, Bitcoin BTC/USD bounced back 1.6%, trading at $58,200.

Wednesday’s Performance Among Major Indices, ETFs

Major IndicesPrice1-day %chg
Russell 20002,162.230.4%
Nasdaq 10019,033.770.4%
Dow Jones40,985.750.1%
S&P 5005,535.160.1%
Updated at 12:35 p.m. ET

According to Benzinga Pro data:

  • The SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust SPY was 0.2% higher to $552.98.
  • The SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average DIA rose 0.2% to $411.03.
  • The tech-heavy Invesco QQQ Trust Series QQQ rose 0.4% to $463.53.
  • The iShares Russell 2000 ETF IWM increase 0.4% to $214.31.
  • The Utilities Select Sector SPDR Fund XLP outperformed, up by 0.8%, while the Energy Select Sector SPDR Fund XLE lagged, down 0.8%.

Wednesday’s Stock Movers

  • Dollar Tree Inc. DLTR sunk 20% after missing quarterly earnings estimates and delivering a guidance cut.
  • Other stocks reacting to company earnings were Dicks Sporting Goods Inc. DKS down 5%, Hormel Foods Corp. HRL down 6.6% and Ciena Corp. CIEN up 2.2%.
  • ASML Holding N.V. ASML fell 3.2% after UBS downgraded the Dutch chipmaker from Buy to Neutral, also cutting the price target.
  • Tesla Inc. TSLA rose 5% on upbeat sales data in China. The China Passenger Car Association reported that sales of Tesla's China-made electric vehicles rose 17% compared to July and increased 3% year-over-year.
  • Companies reporting earnings after the close include Copart Inc. CPRT, Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co HPE and Caseys General Stores Inc. CASY.

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This image was created using artificial intelligence MidJourney.

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