NEW YORK (AP) — Wall Street is holding steadier on Monday, as stocks of chipmakers and other winners of the artificial-intelligence boom trim some of their recent losses.
The S&P 500 was virtually unchanged in late trading, coming off its first losing week in the last three and just its third since the end of March. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 282 points, or 0.5%, with an hour remaining in trading, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.2% higher.
Nvidia added 0.3% and held firmer following its drop on Friday, when it was the heaviest weight on the S&P 500. Sandisk climbed 4% after tumbling 29% last week.
Advanced Micro Devices rose 3.6% after announcing an expanded partnership where Microsoft will use its products for AI, including its new Helios product starting in the second half of the year.
Such stocks have been under pressure for weeks on worries that their prices shot too high in the euphoria around AI. On one hand, companies are making billions of dollars in revenue as customers pour money into AI chips and data centers. But all that spending may fizzle out if AI doesn’t produce as much profit and productivity as promised.
Wall Street may get some hints on that soon as some of the biggest spenders on AI report their latest quarterly results. On Wednesday, Alphabet will tell investors how much it made during the spring and give updates on its AI efforts.
All kinds of companies are under pressure to report strong growth in profit for the spring. They will need to in order to justify the big moves their stock prices have made. Indexes are near their records, even with the recent shakiness for AI stocks.
AMC Entertainment jumped 24.3% after the movie-theater operator reported stronger revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected. It also said some of its theaters in Los Angeles and other cities ran “The Odyssey” for more than 85 straight hours from Thursday through Sunday to meet demand.
Domino’s Pizza climbed 1.8% after delivering stronger revenue for the spring than expected. CEO Russell Weiner said the company saw growth in orders for both its carryout and delivery businesses, even with the broad industry continuing “to face pressure on consumer demand.”
Another restaurant chain, Jersey Mike's, is beginning its roadshow to raise interest in its stock, which it's planning to sell on the New York Stock Exchange for between $21 and $25 per share in an initial public offering.
It and other businesses are facing pressure in selling to U.S. households feeling crunched by still-high inflation, thanks in large part to high gasoline prices. The average cost for a gallon of gasoline in the United States is back above $4.
It's been tracking the increase in crude oil prices. After dropping below $72 early this month, roughly back to where it was before the war with Iran began, the price for a barrel of Brent crude has been jumping recently as fighting continues in the Middle East.
On Monday, the price swung between roughly $86 and $91. It settled at $89.22, up 1.3%.
The war with Iran is keeping oil tankers from using the Strait of Hormuz to deliver crude from the Persian Gulf to customers, which pushes up oil's price. S&P Global counted only 127 vessels crossing the strait during the week through Sunday, down nearly 50% from the week before.
Worries about expensive oil and high inflation have sent Treasury yields higher in the bond market, which threaten to slow the economy and undercut prices for stocks and other investments.
The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.60% from 4.55% late Friday and from just 3.97% before the war with Iran. Higher yields have already sent the average 30-year mortgage rate to its highest level in nearly a year.
On Wall Street, a 3.4% drop for Warner Bros. Discovery helped the S&P 500 erase an early gain. A federal judge ordered it and Paramount to halt their $81 billion merger for at least two weeks, allowing states that are challenging the deal more time to see their case through in court.
In stock markets abroad, indexes ended mixed in Europe.
The moves were sharper in Asia, where South Korea’s Kospi fell 4.5%. It’s been at the center of the huge swings for AI stocks because it’s dominated by two tech companies, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix.
Stocks were stronger in China, where indexes rose 2.4% in Hong Kong and 0.9% in Shanghai.
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AP Business Writers Chan Ho-him and Matt Ott contributed to this report.
