U.S. stocks opened higher on Thursday, clawing back much of the prior day’s losses, after the Federal Reserve under new Chair Kevin Warsh held interest rates steady on Wednesday but signaled it could raise them later this year. In its first meeting with Warsh in charge, the central bank issued an unusually short statement and a “dot plot” showing nine of 18 policymakers expect at least one rate hike in 2026 — a hawkish turn that handed the S&P 500 its worst Fed-day drop under a new chair since 1994, even after the Dow had touched a fresh intraday record earlier in the session. Adding to Thursday’s calmer mood, the Labor Department reported that initial jobless claims fell by 4,000 to 226,000 for the week ended June 13, near forecasts, with the unemployment rate holding at 4.3% for a third straight month.
The rebound was broad. In early trading the S&P 500 rose about 1.15%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.80% and the Nasdaq Composite climbed roughly 1.5%, while the small-cap Russell 2000 lagged. That followed Wednesday’s slide, when the S&P 500 closed at 7,420.10, down 1.21%; the Dow fell 507.12 points, or 0.98%, to 51,492.55; and the Nasdaq dropped 1.34% to 26,021.66.
Market movers. Intel led the gainers, rising about 9% to $131.96 after President Donald Trump said in a social-media post that the chipmaker had agreed to design and build chips in the United States with Apple. Fortrea Holdings added about 7% and Marvell Technology rose roughly 6%. On the downside, Accenture tumbled about 15% and Kroger fell 6.9% to rank among the morning’s worst performers, while medical-device maker NovoCure dropped nearly 19% and Cognizant Technology Solutions slipped around 5%.
Analysts were active. Deutsche Bank kept a buy on Micron Technology and lifted its price target to $1,500 from $1,000, citing a memory-chip shortage tied to the artificial-intelligence boom. UBS upgraded software firm Dynatrace to buy from neutral and raised its target to $60 from $36. TD Cowen analyst Krish Sankar kept a buy on chip-equipment maker Cohu and raised his target to $80 from $60. Wolfe Research lifted Palantir Technologies to peer perform from underperform. The day’s loudest downgrade was Roku: Wedbush cut it to neutral with a $155 target and pulled it from its best-ideas list after Fox said it would buy the streaming-device maker, and Susquehanna, Piper Sandler, JPMorgan and Evercore ISI moved to the sidelines as well. Wells Fargo, meanwhile, was unimpressed by Snap’s new $2,195 “Specs” glasses, calling 100,000 first-generation units a stretch goal.
Commodities and volatility. Oil eased as the U.S.-Iran peace deal calmed supply fears. West Texas Intermediate crude traded near $74 a barrel and Brent sat around $83. Gold slipped about 2% to roughly $4,270 an ounce as buyers stepped back from safe havens. The Cboe Volatility Index, or VIX, which jumped more than 12% to 18.44 on Wednesday after the Fed surprise, eased back toward 17. Bitcoin fell about 1.3% to around $64,300.
The backdrop remains the Federal Reserve and the Middle East. Warsh said the Fed had dropped its forward guidance, leaving little steer on the next move, while this week’s U.S.-Iran memorandum — which calls for reopening the Strait of Hormuz over a 60-day negotiating window — has pulled energy prices down from their wartime highs.
Looking ahead, U.S. markets are closed Friday, June 19, for the Juneteenth holiday, so trading resumes Monday. Next week brings earnings from Micron Technology and FedEx, and the end of the month delivers fresh readings on first-quarter economic growth and the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge, the May personal consumption expenditures index — numbers that will test how seriously markets take Warsh’s hint at a rate hike.
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