Trading on Wall Street is essentially flat early Wednesday on mixed corporate earnings reports and new data on U.S. growth.
Futures for the S&P 500 ticked up 0.1% before the bell, while futures for the Dow Jones industrials fell 0.2%. After hitting a record high on Tuesday, futures for the tech-heavy Nasdaq ticked up another 0.2%.
The U.S. economy grew at a healthy 2.8% annual rate from July through September, with consumers helping drive growth despite the weight of still-high interest rates.
Wednesday’s report from the Commerce Department said the gross domestic product — the economy’s total output of goods and services — slowed slightly from its 3% growth rate in the April-June quarter. But the latest figures still reflect surprising durability just as Americans assess the state of the economy in the final stretch of the presidential race.
Alphabet gained 6.2% after hours on another strong earnings report from Google’s parent company. Alphabet earned $26.3 billion during the most recent quarter, a 34% increase from a year ago. The profits would have been even higher if Google wasn’t pouring so much money into building up its AI arsenal.
The semiconductor sector is under pressure and Qorvo lost nearly one-fifth of its value overnight after it lowered its forecast, saying that consumers are shifting away from high-end android phones to cheaper ones that use lower grade chips. Qorvo forecast third-quarter revenue of about $900 million, well below analysts’ estimates of $1.07 billion. The company, whose profit guidance also came in below targets, fell more than 18% before the bell Tuesday.
Another chipmaker, Advance Micro Devices, fell more than 8% after issuing a mixed earnings report and a disappointing forecast.
Chipmakers were the worst performing sector before the opening bell Wednesday, with Skyworks and Qualcomm falling hard as well.
Reddit soared more than 21% after it surprised investors with a per-share profit in its latest quarter. Wall Street had been expecting a 7 cents-per-share loss, but the online message board platform turned a 16 cents-per-share profit.
Reddit, whose investors include OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, went public in March at $34 a share. Its shares were close to $100 each before markets opened Wednesday.
After soaring 8.8% on Tuesday, Trump Media & Technology Group gave back 5% overnight, with shares falling to about $49. The company, which tends to move more with former President Donald Trump’s re-election odds than on its own profit prospects, moved so sharply on Tuesday that trading of its stock was briefly halted several times. The parent company of Trump’s Truth Social platform has been rallying since hitting a bottom of roughly $12 in late September.
In Europe at midday, France’s CAC 40 slipped 1.4%, while Germany’s DAX dipped 0.9% and Britain’s FTSE 100 shed 0.4%.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was down 1.6% at 20,380.64 and the Shanghai Composite index dropped 0.6% to 3,266.24. In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 index closed up 1.0% at 39,277.39, as the Bank of Japan began a two-day policy meeting on Wednesday.
The European Union has imposed higher tariffs, up to 45.3%, on electric vehicles imported from China. The extra tariffs, which took effect on Wednesday, are the result of over a year of anti-subsidy probes that also prompted countermeasures from Beijing.
China’s Ministry of Commerce on Wednesday said in a statement that it “does not agree with or accept” the tariffs.
Chinese EV companies’ stocks dropped in response. Nio’s Hong Kong-listed stock fell 6.6%, Geely was down 3.0% and BYD shed 0.7%.
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 dipped 0.8% to 8,180.40 after the inflation rate in the third quarter came in at 2.8%, the lowest level in more than three years, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
U.S. benchmark crude oil gained 81 cents to $68.02 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Brent crude, the international standard, surged 82 cents to $71.55 a barrel.
The dollar slipped to 152.88 Japanese yen from 153.36 yen. The euro rose to $1.0833 from $1.0819.
Gold is hitting record highs ahead of Election Day in the U.S., with an ounce fetching more than $2,781 per ounce early Wednesday.
