Live Nasdaq Composite: Markets Tread Carefully as Oil Climbs and Inflation Lingers Above Fed Target

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The Nasdaq Composite dipped 0.2% Thursday in a session defined by cautious optimism on the inflation front and a fresh flare-up in Middle East tensions that sent oil prices climbing back above $90 a barrel. It was a day of offsetting forces, with an in-line inflation reading offering some relief before geopolitical headlines moved back to center stage.

April’s Personal Consumption Expenditures price index came in at a seasonally adjusted 0.4% monthly gain, with the 12-month rate holding at 3.8%, matching economist expectations. The cooler monthly print gave traders a measure of comfort that pricing pressures may be starting to ease, though with inflation still running well above the Federal Reserve’s 2% target, the all-clear is far from sounded.

Oil reasserted itself as a market variable, with WTI crude futures rising roughly 2% to top $90 a barrel and Brent gaining nearly 2% to push above $96, after Iran’s Revolutionary Guard claimed it targeted a U.S. airbase, according to the Tasnim News Agency, following fresh U.S. military strikes on an Iranian military site. The escalation revived concerns over Strait of Hormuz disruptions that markets had only recently begun to look past.

The U.S. economy grew at a 1.6% annualized rate in the first quarter, falling short of the 2.0% estimate and coming in below the initially reported pace, according to the latest GDP revision from the Commerce Department. The downward revision adds to a growing list of data points suggesting the economy is losing some momentum, though the reading still marks a meaningful step up from the prior quarter’s 0.5% growth rate

The session’s standout mover was Snowflake (NYSE:SNOW | SNOW Price Prediction), which soared 38% in premarket trading after delivering a Q1 earnings and revenue beat alongside stronger-than-expected fiscal Q2 guidance. The company also announced a five-year, $6 billion commitment to Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN) Web Services.

Here’s a look at where things stand as of morning trading:

Dow Jones Industrial Average: 50,545 Down 0.19%
Nasdaq Composite: 26,595 Down 0.30%
S&P 500: 7,509 Down 0.14%

Market Movers

FedEx Freight (NYSE:FDXF) is heading to the S&P 500, with the trucking spinoff set to join the index on June 1st, replacing EPAM Systems (NYSE:EPAM) in the process. The addition marks FedEx Freight’s first major index milestone since being spun off from its parent company, a move that is expected to trigger automatic buying from the vast pool of funds benchmarked to the S&P 500.

IBM (NYSE:IBM) is making a decade-defining bet on quantum computing, committing more than $10 billion to the technology over the next five years according to a regulatory filing. The company also reaffirmed its target to deliver its first large-scale fault-tolerant quantum computer by 2029, a milestone that would mark a significant leap from today’s error-prone systems and push IBM to the forefront of what many consider the next major frontier in computing.

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