Stock Market Today: Nasdaq exits correction territory; S&P 500 scores longest winning streak since November 2023 (2024)

Monday highlights

U.S. stocks ended higher on Monday, building on the gains seen last week.

Since the Nasdaq 100 hit a recent low on Aug. 7, technology stocks have been storming back. And it's perhaps no surprise that Nvidia shares have led the way.

Nvidia's stock is up 30.5% from the Aug. 7 low, according to Dow Jones Market Data. That ranks it as the best performer in the Nasdaq 100 over that span.

Next up are other hardware names: Shares of Super Micro are up 26%, shares of Marvell Technology are up 25% and shares of Micron Technology are up 24%.

Rounding out the top five is a nontech play: That's Starbucks' stock, up 23% on enthusiasm for the company's new CEO, who had success at Chipotle Mexican Grill.

The trade where investors long growth stocks and short value stocks has regained favor since its unwind in late July and early August, when equities saw a rotation out of megacap tech companies and into the rest of the market, according to Tyler Richey, co-editor at Sevens Report Research.

The “Magnificent Seven” Big Tech stocks surged last week, leading the gain of the broader tech sector and the rest of the market.

The Vanguard Growth ETF rose 4.8% last week, with its relative strength index returning to positive territory above 50. There was also a renewed increase in its relative strength to the S&P 500, though that remains well below the highs of earlier this year, Richey wrote in a Monday note. The relative strength index is a technical indicator that measures the speed and change of price movements.

Meanwhile, the Vanguard Value ETF gained 2.5% last week. Its relative strength index is positive, but remains below late July highs. That represents “a source of caution regarding the sustainability of the rally while relative strength to the S&P 500 has moderated near 3-month highs amid recent underperformance of value stocks," Richey wrote.

As Democrats begin gathering in Chicago on Monday for their convention, they're doubling down on a proposal to quadruple the tax on stock buybacks.

"We'll increase our new stock buyback tax to 4 percent to discourage stock buybacks that benefit executives and wealthy shareholders, instead of workers and consumers," according to the Democrats' platform, released Sunday.

Biden is scheduled to speak at the convention on Monday night, while Vice President Kamala Harris, the party's nominee for president, is slated to address the event on Thursday.

Shares of Nvidia Corp. were climbing sharply Monday afternoon as the U.S. stock market extended its rebound.

Nvidia was up 3.6% in afternoon trading, FactSet data show, at last check. The chip maker was on track to post a sixth straight day of gains, which would mark its longest winning streak since late March, according to Dow Jones Market Data.

The U.S. stock market was broadly rising Monday, with the S&P 500 up 0.7%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average climbing 0.5% and the Nasdaq Composite gaining 0.9%, according to FactSet data, at last check.

The Roundhill Magnificent Seven ETF, which invests in seven closely watched Big Tech stocks including Nvidia, was advancing a sharp 1.3% in afternoon trading.

Shares of AST SpaceMobile Inc. are up 18.3% Monday, resuming their rally after ending Friday’s session down 1.1%.

AST SpaceMobile’s stock ended Thursday’s session up 50.7% to register its largest percentage increase since May 29, 2024, when it rose 69.23%, Dow Jones Market Data show.

Last week the space-based broadband company said that its first five commercial satellites will be launched next month. The satellites are on target for dedicated orbital launch in the first half of September, AST SpaceMobile said in a business update. The company also said that the satellites are the largest-ever communications arrays to be deployed commercially in low-Earth orbit.

AST SpaceMobile shares are up 507% in 2024, outpacing the S&P 500 index’s gain of 17.3%.

The U.S. stock market has recently shifted its focus to economic growth from inflation, with the S&P 500 reacting more strongly to data showing the state of the economy than inflation figures, according to BofA Global Research.

The S&P 500 earlier this month had the biggest reaction to growth data since the COVID-19 pandemic, a team of BofA strategists led by Ohsung Kwon, equity and quant strategist, said in a Monday note.

"Growth is in the driver's seat... as long as growth is OK, equites can withstand a less-dovish Fed," they wrote. "Equities just need a nod that growth is going to be supported by the Fed."

Investors this week will be keen to hear what the Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell foresees for interest rates at the Kansas City Fed’s annual Jackson Hole Economic Symposium.

"While our view is that risk could be to the upside, we do not believe that Jackson Hole will spur the large equity moves that it has in the past when the Fed used it as forum to telegraph upcoming policy decisions," the BofA strategists said. But they added that stock upside will be limited as the market awaits Nvidia earnings the following week.

Gold futures marked fresh record highs on Monday, lifting the price of bar of gold above $1 million.

Gold for December delivery edged up by $3.50, or 0.1%, to settle at $2,541.30 an ounce, topping the previous all-time high seen on Friday. Prices also climbed to as high as $2,549.90 Monday, the highest intraday level for a most active contract on record. Analysts have attributed the rally in gold to strong buying among Western investors and global central banks.

At that price, a standard 400-troy-ounce gold bar would be worth more than $1 million, as Bloomberg first pointed out on Monday. A gold bar weighing 400 ounces would be worth $1,016,520, to be more exact.

The so-called Trump trade has been one of the most-watched trades in crypto, as traders have placed bets based on Donald Trump’s odds of winning the U.S. presidential election in November.

In general, crypto traders are expecting heightened volatility around the election, as the implied volatility for bitcoin options expiring in November is much higher compared to near-dated options expiring before the election.

“That’s just a reflection of the market pricing in a risk premium over the event,” Bohan Jiang, head of OTC options trading at Abra, said in an interview.

For the past several months, investors have been pricing in and out the so-called “Trump premium,” said Sean Farrell, head of digital-asset strategy at Fundstrat Global Advisors, in an interview earlier this month. That suggests that as a Trump victory is believed to be bullish for bitcoin, the crypto may trade higher as Trump’s odds of winning rise — and vice versa.

Market watchers widely expect Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell to set the tone for a September interest-rate cut in his speech at the Kansas City Fed’s annual Jackson Hole Economic Symposium on Friday.

Powell is due to speak on the economic outlook at 10 a.m. Eastern, following a precedent where Fed chairs almost always give a keynote speech during the high-profile annual gathering that regularly attracts top U.S. and global central bankers. The event runs from Aug. 22 to 24 in Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming.

After all, this year’s conference follows a period of extreme market volatility as traders adjusted their expectations for the Fed’s rate path. A softer-than-expected July jobs report helped spark a sharp stock-market selloff two days after the Fed’s last meeting in July, with the next jobs report to be released the day before the start of the Fed’s communications blackout period ahead of its September meeting. This setup limits policymakers’ ability to influence markets’ expectations, economists at BNP Paribas recently noted.