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Over the past month or so, price action in the stock market has followed a familiar pattern of oil prices up, indexes down, and vice versa. Thursday’s trading was no different, as few signs of concrete progress toward peace in the Middle East sent crude futures higher and stocks lower.
President Donald Trump posted on his Truth Social account earlier today that Iran is “begging” the U.S. to “make a deal,” and warned that “they better get serious soon.”
This follows media reports from Wednesday that indicated the U.S. had sent Iran a 15-point peace plan. While Iran is said to be reviewing the plan, The Wall Street Journal suggests that Tehran finds some of the demands excessive and will not agree to negotiate until the proposals are scaled back.
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The impasse had a positive impact on oil prices Thursday, with the front-month West Texas Intermediate crude futures surging 4.6% to $94.48 per barrel.
Stocks, on the other hand, slumped. At the close, the blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 1.0% at 45,960 and the broader S&P 500 was off 1.7% at 6,477. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite plunged 2.4% to 21,408 – falling into correction territory, which is a 10% drop from its October closing high of 23,958.47.
Down days for a pair of mega-cap stocks had an outsize impact on the Nasdaq today. Meta Platforms (META) slumped 7.9% – its worst day since October 30 – following a pair of legal losses this week.
Specifically, the Facebook parent was ordered to pay $375 million in civil damages in a trial in New Mexico, where the state’s attorney general accused the company of failing to safeguard young users against child predators and abusers.
Separately, a jury in California found that design features, including infinite scroll, on apps created by Meta and YouTube, which is owned by Alphabet’s (GOOGL, -3.4%) Google, were addictive and caused harm to young users.
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The companies were ordered to pay a combined $3 million to the plaintiff in compensatory damages in the bellwether case. The jury also awarded $3 million in punitive damages. Meta is responsible for 70% of the fine, with YouTube on the hook for the rest.
SanDisk stock extends its sell-off
But shares have dropped 28% since then – including today’s 11% decline – and they just closed down for a fifth straight day.
One potential catalyst for the sell-off is Google’s recent introduction of TurboQuant, a new memory compression technique that will make artificial intelligence (AI) models faster and less expensive to run.
Another is likely good old-fashioned profit-taking, especially considering SanDisk has surged tenfold in the past 12 months.
But Morgan Stanley analyst Joseph Moore isn’t overly concerned about the sell-off, seeing it as a “healthy pricing of durability concerns.”
Moore reiterated his Overweight (Buy) rating and $690 price target on the tech stock – representing implied upside of more than 14% to current levels – saying he sees its “strength as more durable than the market thinks, with memory supply remaining a gating factor for AI.”
