Headwinds out of China are weighing on semiconductor stocks this morning
Fresh off a stellar week of gains on Wall Street, futures on all three major indexes are lower ahead of the open today, with Nasdaq-100 Index (NDX) futures down triple digits. Several U.S. tech stocks are slipping, amid news that China plans to block Microsoft (MSFT), Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), and Intel (INTC) chips from being used in government computers. There will be plenty of economic data by the end of this week, including the PCE price index on Friday morning, though the market will be closed for Good Friday.
Continue reading for more on today's market, including:
- Tech stocks are once more powering Wall Street.
- Pros and cons of trading LEAPS in your portfolio.
- Plus, more Boeing drama; Disney upgraded; and a a new deal for Cleveland-Cliffs.
5 Things You Need to Know Today
- The Cboe Options Exchange (CBOE) saw more than 1.4 million call contracts and 955,839 put contracts exchanged Friday. The single-session equity put/call ratio fell to 0.65, while the 21-day moving average remained at 0.71.
- Boeing Co (NYSE:BA) stock, struggling recently amid flaws in its airplanes, is down 2.4% premarket, after news that CEO David Calhoun is stepping down by the end of this year. Since the start of the year, the equity is down 27.5%.
- Walt Disney Co (NYSE:DIS) stock is up 1.1% in electronic trading, after an upgrade from Barclays to "overweight" from "equal weight," with a price-target hike to $135 from $95. DIS hit a 52-week high on Friday before turning lower, and is up 28.3% in 2024.
- The shares of Cleveland-Cliffs Inc (NYSE:CLF) are 1.4% higher before the bell, after the steel company successfully negotiated up to $575 million in funding from the U.S. Depart of Energy (DoE) for two of its projects. Should these gains hold, CLF could mark fresh one-year highs.
- Plenty of economic data still on tap to close out March.
Stocks Slide Overseas as Well
Despite inflation reports out of Singapore and Malaysia that came in better-than-expected, stocks in Asia moved lower today. The former’s inflation levels surged to its highest since July 2023, up 3.6% year-over-year, while the latter saw a rise for the first time since August 2022, reading at 1.8%. For Monday’s trading, Japan’s Nikkei shed 1.2%, pulling back from Friday’s record peak. Elsewhere, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng lost 0.2%, South Korea’s Kospi pared gains to close 0.4% lower, and the Shanghai Composite in China backpedaled 0.7%.
Things are not looking any better in Europe, as popular U.K. stocks Direct Line and Kingfisher plunged intraday. At last check, London’s FTSE 100 and France’s CAC 40 are both off 0.5%, while Germany’s DAX is down 0.06%.