Wall Street Shrugs Off Nvidia's CEO Shock as the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Turn Higher Before Midday, With Chips Split
US stocks opened lower after Jensen Huang's exit from Nvidia, then recovered: by 11:33 am Eastern the S&P 500 and Nasdaq were up 0.3 percent and the Dow 211 points. Chip stocks diverged sharply.
Thursday, November 12, 2026/2 min read
Wall Street flinched at the open on Thursday and then refused to fall. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq composite began the session lower after Nvidia's chief executive resigned, yet by 11:33 am Eastern (16:33 UTC) the Nasdaq was up 0.3 percent, the S&P 500 up 0.3 percent and the Dow up 211 points, or 0.4 percent, according to CNBC's live blog. The session is still in progress, so everything below is a snapshot, not a close.
The swing came from a market that has spent the week testing whether the artificial-intelligence trade can survive its own wobbles. It follows Wednesday's rally, when the S&P 500 closed at 7,619.38.
How did US stocks open on Thursday?
Shortly after 10 am Eastern, the S&P 500 was down 0.39 percent at 7,589.82, the Nasdaq composite down 0.73 percent at 25,281.33 and the Dow up 0.03 percent at 52,500.91, MLQ reported. The Cboe volatility index rose 4.3 percent to 18.24. CNBC had the Nasdaq down as much as 1.5 percent in the first minutes of trading.
Nvidia, one of the market's largest stocks, did the damage. It opened more than 13 percent lower, below $4 trillion in market value, before steadily recovering. Its own move is covered in a separate report; what matters for the indexes is that the selling faded as the morning went on. Volume was heavy, with more than 373 million shares changing hands against a 30-day average of 144.4 million, according to CNBC.
Which stocks are rising and falling?
The chip sector split in two. AMD was up about 4 percent and Broadcom about 5 percent in CNBC's latest reading, as investors moved money toward Nvidia's rivals, while the Philadelphia semiconductor index was down 1.3 percent near the open, with Micron down 2.5 percent, Marvell down 3.8 percent and Oracle down 2.6 percent, MLQ said. TipRanks noted that William Blair upgraded AMD to Buy from Hold.
The AI-infrastructure names that led on Wednesday gave something back. CoreWeave fell 9.1 percent a day after its best session since April 2025, and Nebius dropped 16.2 percent after third-quarter results in which revenue beat expectations but guidance disappointed and it raised its 2026 capital spending outlook, according to MLQ and TipRanks.
What is the Federal Reserve saying about rate hikes?
The rate path remains the backdrop. Cleveland Fed president Beth Hammack said she supports raising rates further but favors a gradual approach and does not see a half-point move as necessary now. She said: "I think we need to move rates higher."
The 10-year Treasury yield was about 5.06 percent at the open, up roughly 7 basis points, after the bond market reopened from its Veterans Day closure, MLQ said. Initial jobless claims came in at 200,000 against a consensus of 195,000, per CNBC.
What comes next for stocks today and next week?
The rest of Thursday brings the afternoon session, then earnings from Cisco, Applied Materials and Cerebras after the close. Nvidia reports its third-quarter results on Tuesday 17 November, the first under interim leadership, and that date is now the market's next big test. If the Nasdaq can hold its gain through the close, it will have absorbed a very large single-stock shock in one session.
Published in The Outspoken Digest
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