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Closing Bell
4:05 pm
Stocks are closing in on records for a second consecutive day, driven by AI chip enthusiasm and a sharp drop in oil prices tied to reports of a potential U.S.-Iran peace deal. Advanced Micro Devices (AMD +18.37%) surged 17% on strong earnings, while Intel (INTC +4.36%) added 2.7% after yesterday’s big run. The Nasdaq rose more than 2%, with the S&P 500 and Dow both up as well. Positive results from Disney (DIS +7.60%) and Uber (UBER +8.64%) added to the momentum.
- AMD’s earnings catalyst: AMD’s 17% jump signals that investors see the AI chip trade as far from over — and peers like Intel are riding the same wave.
- Oil math doesn’t help drivers yet: Brent and U.S. crude fell 7%+ on Iran peace hopes, but gas prices hit $4.54/gallon — the highest since July 2022 and up from under $3 when the war began.
Elon Musk Wants the World’s Biggest Chip Factory
3:35 pm
Elon Musk’s Terafab chip ambitions just got a price tag: $55 billion to start, up to $119 billion all-in. SpaceX is already asking Grimes County, Texas, for a property tax break — a public hearing is set for June 3. Intel (INTC +4.36%) is signed on to help build chips using its 14A process for Tesla (TSLA +2.40%) and friends.
- Why not just call TSMC? Musk’s companies can’t get priority at Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (TSM +6.30%) — so he’s building his own foundry. One analyst calls it a "15-year strategy."
- SpaceX IPO subplot: SpaceX filed confidentially for an IPO in April post-xAI merger — Terafab’s ambitions could loom large in that prospectus.
Cash is Still King At Berkshire
3:04 pm — BRKB +0.66%
By Buck Hartzell
Greg Abel took the stage as CEO of Berkshire Hathaway (BRKB +0.86%) for the first time. Berkshire reported a very nice quarter too. Operating earnings grew 17.6% YoY to $11.346 billion. Berkshire has been a net seller of stocks for 14 consecutive quarters now. They hold nearly $380 billion in cash. That’s 30% of total assets in cash or about double the historical average. Yes, stocks are surprisingly expensive today. Abel explained how he will be disciplined in deploying capital. I’m hopeful he will decentralize allocation a bit more. Berkshire is a good alternative to an index fund.
Upstart Grows Fast, Spends Faster, and Margins Take a Hit
2:48 pm — UPST -8.50%
Upstart (UPST 7.67%) delivered a blowout top line — $308.2 million in Q1 revenue, up 44%, crushing estimates. Loan originations surged 61% to $3.4 billion. The catch? Sales and marketing costs nearly doubled, blowing out margins and widening the GAAP operating loss. The stock shed more than 8%.
- The Spend That Stung: Marketing hit $104.4 million — management called it an "investment in digital channels," but investors called it a sell-off.
- Silver Lining Ahead: Full-year guidance held firm at $1.4 billion in revenue and $294 million in adjusted EBITDA, with management promising a stronger second half.
| Metric (GAAP unless noted) | Q1 2026 | Q1 2025 | Y/Y change |
|---|---|---|---|
| EPS (diluted) | ($0.07) | ($0.03) | (133.3%) |
| Revenue (millions) | $308 | $213 | +44.6% |
| Contribution Profit (millions) | $137 | $102 | +34.3% |
| Adjusted EBITDA1(millions) | $40.5 | $42.6 | -4.9% |
| Transaction Volume (billions) | $3.4 | $2.1 | +61.5% |
Can Vertical Video Save Disney's Streaming?
1:20 pm -- DIS +6.6%
New Walt Disney (DIS +7.60%) CEO Josh D’Amaro, who took the helm in March, has unveiled a strategic shift centered on high-tech storytelling and aggressive streaming monetization. Following a 6% stock jump, D’Amaro outlined a three-pillar growth plan focused on intellectual property, global consumer engagement, and artificial intelligence. While the company is scrapping a $1 billion investment in OpenAI's discontinued Sora platform, it is doubling down on internal AI to drive efficiencies in content production and theme park operations. This strategy follows a milestone quarter where streaming revenue growth hit double digits, buoyed by the "Verts" vertical video feed and rate adjustments that have Disney targeting 10% streaming growth for the full year.
- Franchise Synergy: The massive $1.9 billion box office for Zootopia 2 serves as a blueprint for D'Amaro’s vision, as the hit is already being leveraged across Disney+ streaming, cruise lines, and theme park retail.
- Streamlining Success: By halting the proposed ESPN spinoff and exploring a unified "Super App," Disney aims to resolve digital fragmentation and boost user retention through a seamless ecosystem.
Musk and Anthropic: A $900B AI Alliance?
1:15 pm
Anthropic has secured a massive compute deal with Elon Musk’s SpaceX, gaining exclusive access to the 300-megawatt Colossus 1 data center in Memphis. This partnership is a surprising pivot given Musk’s public criticism of the startup, which is currently seeking a $900 billion valuation. The agreement aims to bolster capacity for Claude Pro users and includes a futuristic proposal to develop gigawatts of compute capacity in space. While Anthropic battles a Pentagon blacklist and ongoing litigation with the Trump administration, it is now utilizing infrastructure built by its primary rival, xAI, which was absorbed by SpaceX earlier this year.
- Environmental Friction: The Memphis facility utilizes dozens of natural gas turbines that have sparked local protests over air pollution, presenting a potential ESG hurdle for Anthropic's backers.
- The Orbiting Brain: The "interest" in space-based development suggests a strategic move to bypass terrestrial power constraints, potentially leveraging the Starlink network from Alphabet (GOOG +2.92%) and SpaceX partners to scale future models.
Visa Flexes Its Moat and Earnings Power
12:15 pm -- V -1.2%
By Buck Hartzell
Visa (V 0.94%) reported excellent Q2 2026 earnings. Global payments volume jumped 9% to $3.7 trillion. Revenue grew 17% YoY to $11.2 billion. EPS grew 20% to $3.31. Visa bought back another $7.9 billion of their own shares (largest buyback in company history). Visa is moving big into agentic commerce and micro transactions. They are also working hard to become the connector between stablecoins/blockchain and the real world. Visa now supports 160 stablecoin-linked card programs globally. Visa's vast network and scale make them a key partner for fintech players, not someone that's easily displaced.
Novo Nordisk Hunts for New Deals
12:35 pm -- NVO +2.0%
Novo Nordisk (NVO +2.11%) is shifting into offensive mode as CEO Mike Doustdar announced the pharmaceutical giant is "more active than ever" in pursuing acquisitions to broaden its pipeline. While the company pioneered the GLP-1 market with Ozempic and Wegovy, it has recently lost market share to rival Eli Lilly (LLY 0.12%). To counter analyst skepticism regarding its long-term growth, Novo is accelerating development of CagriSema and zenagamtide. This aggressive deal-making stance follows a strong first quarter where Wegovy pill sales topped expectations, prompting the company to raise its full-year profit guidance.
- Winning the Oral Race: While Lilly leads in weekly injections, Novo has secured an early advantage in the emerging weight-loss pill category, a shift that could define the next phase of the obesity market.
- Internal Optimism: Doustdar hints at undisclosed high-conviction assets currently under development, challenging investors to look beyond current competition to a "broader" future portfolio.
NYSE: NVO
Key Data Points
Nvidia and Corning's Light-Speed Deal
11:40 am -- GLW +13.9%
Corning (GLW +11.88%) shares jumped 10% Wednesday following a massive partnership with Nvidia (NVDA +5.93%) to build three dedicated U.S. manufacturing plants. The deal allows Nvidia to invest up to $2.7 billion in the glassmaker, including warrants for 15 million shares, as the chip giant moves to replace traditional copper wiring with fiber optics. This "co-packaged optics" shift aims to increase data speeds while slashing power consumption by up to 20 times. For Corning, which is already a key supplier for Apple (AAPL +1.18%) and Meta Platforms (META +1.33%), this 10-fold capacity increase cements its role as a premier AI infrastructure play.
- Efficiency Unleashed: Replacing the 5,000 copper cables in Nvidia’s "Vera Rubin" racks with optical glass reduces signal loss and allows data to move at the speed of light.
- Domestic Dominance: The expansion adds 3,000 jobs across North Carolina and Texas, leveraging Corning’s 1970 invention of optical fiber to de-risk the AI supply chain.
NYSE: GLW
Key Data Points
SharkNinja's Global Push Pays Off
11:15 am -- SN -3.6%
By Sanmeet Deo
Team Rule Breakers
SharkNinja (SN 1.55%) delivered a genuinely strong Q1 2026. Net sales grew 15.3% to $1.41 billion, adjusted EPS of $1.09 blew past the $1.02 consensus, and management raised full-year guidance on revenue, earnings, and EBITDA. Oh, and international sales surged 31.6% -- accelerating sharply from 13% just a year ago. On paper, this looks like a company firing on all cylinders.
So why is the stock down more than 5% as I write this?
The culprit is a combination of elevated expectations and an ugly gross margin print.
Software Giant Kyndryl Cuts Workforce
10:15 am -- KD -10.2%
Kyndryl (KD 10.82%) shares plummeted over 12% Wednesday after the IBM (IBM 1.38%) spinoff announced a major workforce reduction and issued fiscal 2027 profit guidance that trailed Wall Street estimates. While quarterly revenue of $3.77 billion narrowly beat expectations, adjusted profit of 18 cents per share missed the 45-cent mark by a mile. The company is aggressively restructuring low-margin contracts inherited during the 2021 split, aiming to slash up to $500 million in annual costs by 2028. This pivot follows recent management turnover and an internal accounting review, adding a layer of risk for investors despite resilient demand for IT integration.
- Cleaning the Slate: The restructuring involves $200 million in severance charges as Kyndryl attempts to transition away from the "no-margin" legacy debt left behind by its former parent company.
- Essential Service Moat: Despite the bottom-line misses, the enterprise remains a vital partner for corporations navigating trade-driven uncertainty, as businesses prioritize spending on the day-to-day IT infrastructure required to run artificial intelligence.
Opening Bell
9:35 am -- AMD +19.4%, INTC +3.4%
Markets are rallying this Wednesday as the Dow climbed over 500 points on optimism surrounding a potential end to the U.S.-Iran conflict. While President Trump cautioned that a deal is not guaranteed, the "Project Freedom" pause sent West Texas Intermediatefutures down 5% to $96. Tech is leading the charge, sparked by Advanced Micro Devices (AMD +18.37%), which soared 16% after beating estimates and issuing a stellar second-quarter forecast. This earnings strength is lifting the broader VanEck Semiconductor ETF (SMH +5.18%) and helping Intel (INTC +4.36%) extend its recent record-breaking run.
Market indexes
Top of the Morning
9:20 am -- AMD +14.3% in pre-market trading
By Emily Flippen, CFA
Team Rule Breakers
AMD's (AMD +18.37%) first quarter earnings report just blew expectations out of the water, and in my opinion, justifies not just the strong nearly 20% pre-market pop but also warrants a change in the way investors think about this chip business. Investors have always been cautious with AMD since to many it felt like the business was playing catch-up to Nvidia (NVDA +5.93%), capturing the remaining tailwinds of a GPU tide that is being driven by its larger competitor. But this quarter showed that AMD's lead in CPUs can be just as beneficial to its growth trajectory as its improving competitive position in GPUs.
NASDAQ: AMD
Key Data Points
Today's Breakfast News
9:15 am -- AMD +14.7% in pre-market trading
Advanced Micro Devices (AMD +18.37%) jumped 17% in pre-market trading after beating expectations in the first quarter of fiscal 2026 – on a day when chip stocks pushed the S&P 500 and Nasdaq to new record highs. The chipmaker – beating the S&P 500 by 55% since its 2024 Stock Advisor recommendation by Team Rule Breakers – saw revenue surge 38% in the quarter year over year (YOY), with non-GAAP earnings per share (EPS) up 43%.
- "Accelerating demand for AI infrastructure across our portfolio": CEO Lisa Su spoke of the driving force behind AMD's stunning start to the year, describing the quarter as "a clear inflection in our growth trajectory and a structural shift in our business." AMD's partnership with Meta (META +1.33%) should see the deployment of 6 gigawatts of Instinct graphics processing units (GPUs).
- Guidance for Q2 revenue to reach $11.2 billion: Management predicts a 9% revenue rise between this quarter and the next, which would mean a YOY increase of 46% in Q2.
