Contracts on the S&P 500 (ES=F) and the Nasdaq 100 (NQ=F) tumbled 0.8% and 1.2%, respectively. Dow Jones Industrial Average futures (YM=F), which include fewer tech names, saw a more moderate fall, down 0.4%.
Oracle’s stock lost more than 10% after its quarterly revenue fell short of expectations. That raised fresh concerns about demand for its cloud infrastructure products, as investors watched for signals of a wider AI bubble. Oracle’s growing debt and reliance on OpenAI (OPAI.PVT) to hit its lofty revenue targets have proved a worry for Wall Street.
The puts the spotlight on a weekly update on jobless claims on Thursday, while delayed readings on wholesale inventories and trade sales could draw more scrutiny than usual.
Meanwhile, earnings reports continue with Broadcom (AVGO), Costco (COST) and Lululemon (LULU) all set to release results, rounding out an unpredictable season for AI and retail traders.
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AM scan: Netflix, Marvell and Strategy
Netflix (NFLX) stock rose more than 1% in premarket trading on Thursday. The streaming service is currently involved in a bidding war for Warner Bros Discovery (WBD) with Paramount Skydance (PSKY), and now President Trump has said that the sale must include CNN.
Marvell (MRVL) stock fell 2% before the bell on Thursday after a report in the Information claimed the chipmaker faced the risk of losing orders to Microsoft (MSFT) and Amazon Web Services (AMZN).
Strategy (MSTR) stock fell 2% in premarket trading Thursday. The drop follows bitcoin (BTC-USD)’s decline this morning. Strategy is one of the largest corporate holders of bitcoin.
Oracle woes ruin cross-asset party as traders flock to safety
Bloomberg reports:
A market party after the Federal Reserve’s policy decision came to an abrupt halt within hours as a plunge in Oracle Corp.’s (ORCL) shares reawakened concerns over tech-stock valuations. Now investors are left to ponder whether they will still get a Christmas rally.
The MSCI All Country World Index had been a whisker away from its peak before changing course, while gold snapped what would have been a three-day winning streak. The earlier gains were a reflection of enthusiasm following the Fed’s latest interest rate cut and Chair Jerome Powell’s upbeat assessment of the US economy.
The upbeat mood faded after Oracle’s stock plunged on the company’s below-consensus sales and spending increase that rekindled worries over tech shares’ expensive valuations. That caused Nasdaq (NQ=F) futures to slump as much as 1.6% and 10-year Treasury yields (^TNX) to drop by three basis points at one point.
The quick sentiment reversal underscores how stubbornly the fears of an artificial intelligence bubble are weighing on investor minds, despite a brief return of risk appetite induced by expectations of further Fed easing in recent weeks. The fresh doubts on AI, as well as Powell’s latest suggestion that the Fed had acted sufficiently to help stabilize the labor market, are ramping up uncertainties in the final weeks of the year.
Novo Nordisk is trading as if the obesity drug craze never happened
Bloomberg reports:
Novo Nordisk A/S (NVO, NOVO-B.CO) shares have fallen so much this year that it’s almost as if the frenzy around weight-loss drugs that propelled the Danish pharmaceutical company’s meteoric rise never happened.
The shares have plunged more than 50% so far in 2025, on track for their worst-ever year, amid disappointing clinical trial results, multiple profit warnings and intense competition in the obesity-drug market. The slump has virtually wiped out several years of stellar gains that came after Novo’s Wegovy drug was approved as a weight-loss treatment in 2021.
It’s a stunning reversal of fortunes for a company that started this year as Europe’s most valuable listed firm. And with the main compound patent for semaglutide — the key ingredient in Wegovy and Ozempic — set to expire in 2032 in the US, some investors are worried about where future sales growth will come from.
“When I look at it right now, organically, their pipeline doesn’t convince me that this situation is manageable,” said Paul Major, a portfolio manager at Bellevue Asset Management. Major, who sold shares in Novo earlier this year, said the stock will probably continue to de-rate until investors see a compelling catalyst to reassure them on Novo’s future growth.
