Early Look

Friday, August 29, 2025

The market survived NVDA earnings and bounced, but will it survive MRVL? Disappointing data center revenues, soft next-quarter guidance and discussions of lumpiness pushed the stock lower by almost 15%, revived data center concerns and certainly contributed to index futures being red across the board. Perhaps the lumpiness is just timing, but satisfaction equals performance minus expectations and performance did not meet expectations so, … Perhaps today’s PCE data will support Fed-watchers’ hopes and dreams and all will be right in the world again and investors will do what they have been inclined to do: buy the dip.

In Asian markets, The Nikkei Index lost 0.26% to 42,718 and Shanghai Index climbed 0.37% to $3,858 while the Hang Seng Index gained 0.32% to 25,077. In Europe, it’s a mirror of the pre-mkt US as the German DAX is slipping by 0.40% to 23,943 while the FTSE 100 dips by 0.23% to 9,195 and the CAC 40 loses 0.42% to 7,730.

• The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 71.67 points, or 0.16%, to 45,636.90
• The Nasdaq Composite gained 115.02 points, or 0.53%, to 21,705.16
• The Russell 2000 Index advanced 4.62 points, or 0.19% to 2,378.41

• 8:30 AM ET                   Personal Spending M/M for July…prior +0.1%
• 8:30 AM ET PCE Price Index M/M for July…est. +0.2% (prior +0.3%)
• 8:30 AM ET PCE Price Index Y/Y for July…est. +2.6% (same as prior)
• 8:30 AM ET                  Core PCE Price Index M/M for July…est. +0.3% (same as prior)
• 8:30 AM ET                  Core PCE Price Index Y/Y for July…est. +2.9% (vs. prior +2.8%)
• 8:30 AM ET                  Advance goods Trade Balance…est. (-$89.45B)
• 9:45 AM ET                  Chicago PMI for August…est. 46.0 (prior 47.1)
• 10:00 AM ET                University of Michigan Confidence, Aug-F…est. 58.6
• 10:00 AM ET                university of Michigan 1-yr and 5-yr inflation expectations
• 1:00 PM ET                   Baker Hughes Weekly rig count data

• Iran’s Foreign Minister: Iran ready to resume diplomatic negotiations over its nuclear program provided that other parties demonstrate seriousness and goodwill.
• Venezuela UN envoy: US naval deployment violates UN charter; Venezuela does not constitute a threat to anyone.
• Israeli military says it has begun preliminary operations and initial stages of the attack on Gaza city
• Signs of Chinese influence abound in Moscow before Putin’s Beijing visit
• Russia condemns European move to launch UN sanctions process against Iran over nuclear program
• Chips-for-rare-earths is US-China circuit breaker

• Petco Heath & Wellness (WOOF) moved higher in afterhours (AHs) trading following a double beat; Petco still sees FY25 revenue down in low single digits from $6.12B in 2024.
• With a strong EPS beat, a revenue beat and a standout Q2 SSS of +6.7%, shares of Ulta Beauty (ULTA) soared in the AHs session.
• Gap Inc (GAP) saw its shares fall in AHs following an EPS beat, met sales and mixed forward guidance with tariff costs playing a negative part.
• Disney (DIS) filed an automatic mixed securities shelf after the markets closed, no terms.
• PepsiCo (PEP) is noted to boost interest in Celsius (CELH) to 11%.
• Spirit Aviation Holdings Inc. (FLYY) is in talks with Frontier Group Holdings Inc. (ULCC) about its efforts to rebuild after emerging from bankruptcy, with a meeting between Spirit Chairman Robert Milton and Frontier chair Bill Franke.

Energy,

• TXNM Energy (TXNM) shareholders voted overwhelmingly to approve the agreement under which Blackstone Infrastructure will acquire TXNM Energy for $61.25 in cash.

Financials

• Shares of Webull Corp (BULL) were higher in AHs following a large revenue YoY beat in its 1^st earnings report as a public company.
• Affirm Holdings (AFRM) handily beat YoY EPS ($0.20 vs ($0.14), beat sales estimates and raised their outlook leading to a strong AHs trading gain.
• Stifel Financial (SF) reported July total client assets of $522.3B.

Healthcare

• Globus Medical (GMED) announced that a Delaware jury has returned a verdict in favor of Globus in its patent infringement litigation against Life Spine.
• The White House selected Jim O’Neill, a top deputy to RFK Jr., to serve as acting head of the CDC after a clash over vaccine policy ended in the departure of several agency leaders per the Washington Post last night.
• J&J (JNJ) will not proceed with clinical development of nipocalimab in combination with an anti-TNFα therapy for RA. No new safety concerns were found per J&J press release.
• CVS Health Group (CVS) holds off on offering covid vaccines in 16 states. The country’s largest pharmacy chain said it needed a C.D.C. panel to recommend the shots before it could offer them nationwide. NYT
• BeOne Medicines Ltd. (ONC) announced positive topline results from a Phase 1/2 study (BGB-11417-201) of sonrotoclax, a next-generation and potentially best-in-class investigational BCL2 inhibitor, in adult patients with relapsed/refractory (R/R) mantle cell lymphoma (MCL), following treatment with a Bruton’s tyrosine kinase inhibitor (BTKi) and anti-CD20 therapy.
• Eli Lilly & Co (LLY) is partnering with Chinese online healthcare platform JD Health International Inc. to sell its blockbuster drugs for obesity and diabetes online, following in competitors’ footsteps to drive sales through direct-to-consumer channels.

Industrials and Materials

• Genco Shipping & Trading (GNK) announces appointment of John C. Wobensmith as Chairman and Kathleen C. Haines as lead independent director as CEO James Dolphin retires.
• Shares of Caterpillar Inc (CAT) fell in AHs trading after they forecast an approximate $500M-$600M impact from tariffs in 3Q25 in a regulatory filing.
• Cameco (CCJ) cuts McArthur River/Key Lake production forecast to 14-15M lb. of U3O8.
• Boeing Co. (BA) enters $3B revolving credit agreement – SEC filing
• Ford (F) may cut over 470 jobs at two South African plants per Bloomberg.

Technology, Media & Telecom

• Nvidia (NVDA) CEO Huang says starting to have talks with Trump administration concerning Blackwell chips; says conversation with White House on allowing Blackwell chip sales to China “will take a while” in interview late yesterday on Fox. Additionally, Huang states that China has not ordered any of the inferior H20 chips.
• US FTC tells Google (GOOGL) not to filter emails sent by Republicans per Axios.
• Autodesk (ADSK) shares moved sharply higher in the afterhours following an EPS/sales double beat and raised forward guidance. CFO: “While our full year macroeconomic assumptions are unchanged, we have raised our full year guidance to reflect the underlying strength of the business in the first half of the year and additional foreign exchange tailwinds.”
• Shares of Marvell Technology (MRVL) fell following an EPS beat; sales miss and lowered Q3 guidance.
• Following an EPS miss and met sales expectations, shares of SentinelOne (S) moved higher in AHs on the strength of raised Q3 sales outlook. CEO: “We surpassed $1B in ARR and delivered record net new ARR, continuing to deliver robust growth and platform adoption across AI, data, cloud, and endpoint.”
• Iren Ltd (IREN) saw its shares move higher in AHs after announcing they had expanded their AI cloud to 10.9k GPUs, securing Nvidia (NVDA) preferred partner status and additional financing secured. Iren also reported Q4 results.
• Dell Technologies (DELL) saw its shares fall after an EPS/sales double-beat and raised guidance across the board except concerningQ3 adj EPS, which they lowered. Called AI a significant tailwind.
•  Cognizant (CTSH) today announced a strategic initiative to industrialize agentic AI across enterprises by deploying 1,000 context engineers over the next year. This move marks a pivotal investment in the emerging discipline of context engineering, which is essential to enabling AI agents to reason, act, and adapt in alignment with enterprise goals.
• Amkor (AMKR) announced revised plans for the location of the company’s new semiconductor advanced packaging and test facility in Arizona.
• Alibaba (BABA) creates AI chip to help China fill Nvidia void. Chinese tech companies spark market exuberance by signaling they are catching up to U.S. Despite challenges, China is finding ways to work around U.S. restrictions and boost its AI capabilities. WSJ
• Alibaba (BABA) reports Q1 EPS $2.06 vs. $2.26 YoY and Q1 revenue $34.57B vs. $33.47B YoY. Shares are +3% in pre-market trading despite the EPS miss because of good numbers in their AI and cloud units as well as the WSJ chip article.
• Youlife (YOUL) announced that operating company within the group has entered into a joint venture agreement with Beijing Galbot, a pioneer in embodied intelligent robotics.
• TSMC (TSM) is planning to market a system to manage and leverage trade secrets to companies in Europe and the United States, Wen-Yee Lee of Reuters reports, citing comments made by the company’s associate general counsel.
• Elon Musk Seeks to Dismiss SEC Suit Over Twitter Stake Disclosure.
• Bain Is Said to Draw Chinese Bidders for $4B Data Centers