US stocks ended mixed on Thursday, with the S&P 500 down 0.3% and the Nasdaq off 1%, while the Dow Jones added about 270 points. The uneven performance came after a strong rally in the previous session, driven by a Democratic sweep of Congress in the US midterm elections.
The market continued to rotate out of AI-related and technology shares amid worries that a Democratic victory could bring tighter regulation of US data centres and dampen semiconductor demand. Chipmakers faced heavy selling, with Nvidia down 2.7%, Broadcom 3.8%, Micron 5.4%, AMD 9.6% and Applied Materials 5.9%. Tesla and SpaceX also extended recent declines, losing 5.7% and 4.5%, respectively. Qualcomm sank nearly 12% after issuing a weak profit outlook.
In contrast, energy and financial stocks were among the session’s strongest performers. Alphabet rose 0.7%, Amazon gained 1.5%, Eli Lilly advanced 1.0% and JPMorgan closed 1.1% higher.
