Nasdaq jumps 2% to close at a record, buoyed by surge in AI stocks, as well as cooling oil and yields

The Nasdaq Composite posted a new record close on Monday.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq jumped 2.26% to 27,122.09, while the S&P 500 gained 1.49% to 7,764.70. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 366.19 points, or 0.71%, to 52,048.83.

— Sean Conlon

Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at CFRA, noted that the old adage “Sell Rosh Hashana, buy Yom Kippur” exemplifies the seasonal support the stock market is currently enjoying. On Monday, the day of Yom Kippur, the major averages were higher across the board.

He told CNBC’s “The Exchange” on Monday that the technical setup also looks promising: “Technicians feel that we might be in the process of confirming a bullish flag breakout, and so right now … I think investors are going to be rotating, trying to jockey from position with sectors and also looking very closely at the charts.”

To be sure, the likelihood of a new rate hiking cycle could mean further volatility ahead for stocks. But the strategist noted that the historical track record for the period post-midterm election years is generally positive, boding well for equities.

In data going back to World War II, the S&P 500 has gained a total return of more than 20% on average in the 12 months after midterm election years, he said.

— Sarah Min

The Nasdaq Composite was on pace for a record close for the first time since June 2 as of late trading Monday.

As of 2:46 p.m., the technology-heavy index was trading above 27,100, higher than the previous record close of 27,093.90. The Nasdaq’s 2.2% rise was its best since it rose almost 2.6% on August 4.

Nasdaq Composite intraday chart.

Shares of Meta Platforms were up nearly 12% in afternoon trading on Monday, pacing for its best day in more than a year.

If its performance holds through the close, the stock will notch its best day since April 9, 2025, when the stock gained 14.76%.

Here are some of the companies making headlines in midday trading:

• HP– Shares of the computer manufacturer slid more than 3% after HP declined to provide details on its outlook for the fiscal year. In a filing withthe Securities and Exchange Commission, HP said that it remains in its planning period for fiscal 2027. The company also said its preliminary assumption is that industrywide personal computer unit volumes will fall by mid-single digits in percentage terms for the calendar year 2027 versus 2026.
• Energy stocks – Oil stocks slid to start the week as the commodity dropped.West Texas Intermediate futuresfor October delivery dropped more than 5% and headed for the worst day in more than a month. TheState Street Energy Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLE)lost 2% asConocoPhillips,Exxon MobilandOccidental Petroleumdropped about 3% each.
• Arhaus— Shares for thehome furnishings brandjumped nearly 12% after Jefferies upgraded the company to buy from hold. Analyst Jonathan Matuszewski said he has “newfound optimism” on the company’s strategy to increase brand awareness.

Read the full list here.

— Darla Mercado

Shares of mining company Critical Metals Corp. surged following comments from President Donald Trump on Friday that the U.S. had struck a deal with Denmark on the security status of Greenland and that the U.S. would be establishing a military presence on the island.

Shares of the rare earth element miner were up 37% in midday trading on Monday.

CRML, 1-day

“We will immediately begin the process of developing a large Military presence in the appropriate part of Greenland, of which there are many,” Trump said Friday on his social media website Truth Social.

Danish Foreign ​Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen said Saturday that tensions over the territorial status of the North Atlantic island, which have simmered at different times during the second Trump administration, may soon pass. Following multiple threats by Trump to annex Greenland in recent months, Denmark and other European countries sent troops to Greenland in January as part of a security exercise.

“A time of uncertainty will hopefully give way to a binding agreement that strengthens security in ​the Arctic and the North Atlantic” Rasmussen said Saturday, according to new agency Reuters.

— Tobias Burns

A settlement has been reached between Paramount Skydance and the states suing to block its plans to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery, Bloomberg reported Monday.

Four holdout states — Massachusetts, New York, Connecticut and Minnesota — worked over the weekend to reach the settlement, which was initially outlined with California, Bloomberg said.

The deal is expected to be announced Monday and should clear the way for the merger, which will result in the largest portfolio of TV networks in the U.S.

— Michelle Fox

Advanced Micro Devicesstock surged 9% on Monday, pushing shares to a record high and topping a $1 trillion market cap benchmark for the first time.

The chip giant’s shares hit an intraday high of $613.92, which boosted the company’s value just above $1 trillion. Read more.

— Chris Eudaily

The ETF tracks the Magnificent Seven stocks which include Nvidia, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Alphabet, Meta Platforms and Tesla.

Meta has been one of the recent drivers. The stock was pacing for its best day since Sept. 9, when it jumped 6.6%, on track for a sixth straight positive session.

Meta stock price

MAGS has climbed sharply over the past three years as mega-cap technology stocks have continued to lead the broader market.

— Gina Francolla and Deena Zaidi

Shares of chipmaker AMD surged 8% in morning trading on Monday, bringing the stock to an all time high.

AMD shares rose 8% over the course of last week, propelled by Thursday comments from cloud provider Nebius that it would be raising pricing rates for some of its central processing units made by AMD and Intel, according to news agency Reuters.

AMD, 1-day

The three major averages began Monday’s session in the green.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 307 points, or 0.6%, just after the opening bell. The S&P 500 rose 0.6%, and the Nasdaq Composite advanced 0.8%.

— Sean Conlon

Shares of Ciena are up more than 6% in the premarket Monday after Evercore ISI upgraded the high-speed networking equipment provider to outperform from in-line, while increasing its price target to $550 from $375, implying a 58% upside.

The firm sees further upside to Ciena’s business solutions which are used to power artificial intelligence.

In particular, the company’s optical networking segment is “quickly emerging as a critical bottleneck in the AI buildout,” analysts wrote, while adding other avenues for growth that should lead to margin expansion.

CIEN, 1-day

Here are some of the companies making headlines in premarket trading:

• Paramount, Warner Bros. Discovery — Shares jumped over 5.8% and 7%, respectively after The Wall Street Journal reported over the weekend that ​Paramount and California’s Attorney General Rob Bonta discussed settlement details over a lawsuit that was blocking the merger between the two media giants.
• Accenture — Shares for the professional services company jumped over 6% after Accenture said Friday it would partner with Anthropic and evaluate the AI company’s models. Both companies would invest at least $1 billion for “building capacity in this area,” according to Anthropic’s announcement. It comes after Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei pushed to slow down AI development.
• Coinbase— The crypto exchange gained more than 4%, following bitcoin higher to start the week. The digital currency climbed to a high of $85,229.44, a level not seen since Jan. 29. Monday’s move builds on the stock’s recent sharp gain. Coinbase shares popped 10% last week after regulatorscleared a path for tokenized stocks.

Read here for the full list.

— Ananya Chetia

Crypto jumped to start the week after moves by key financial regulators last week eased investor uncertainty while short covering and broader risk appetite added fuel to the rally.

The price of bitcoin advanced 4% to $84,671.80, according to Coin Metrics. Earlier, it rose as high as $85,229.44, its highest level since January. Coinbase, Circle and Strategy each gained 5% in premarket trading.

The relief rally comes after the Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday opened a temporarypath for platformsto let peopletrade tokenized stocks and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission proposed a set of crypto marketrules to theWhite House forreview. Having both regulators begin the processof regulating cryptorather than waitingfor Congress to do so, two days after the landmark Clarity Act failed to advance in the Senate, has reduced some of the perceived regulatory uncertainty around crypto.

The move was amplified by a cascade of short covering, with more than $300 million in short bitcoin positions liquidated over the past 24 hours, according to CoinGlass. Crypto is also benefiting from markets digesting the Fed’s rate hike and broader risk appetite supported by falling oil prices and improving U.S.-China relations.

— Tanaya Macheel

Shares of Greenland-linked U.S. stocks jumped in premarket trading after U.S. President Donald Trump announced a security deal regarding the Arctic island.

Shares of Greenland Energy soared more than 144% during premarket trading, with Greenland Mines seen up nearly 70% and Critical Metals Corp more than 30% higher.

The agreement, which is expected to be signed during the United Nations General Assembly this week, sees the U.S., Denmark and Greenland enter into a pact to develop a significant military presence on the island, although key details have yet to be made public.

— Sam Meredith

Novo shares fell as much as 7% on Monday after the company laid out new growth ambitions to revive its fortunes in the booming obesity drug market.

The Danish company seeks to convince investors it can compete in an increasingly crowded field it helped pioneer.

The company said it aims to launch more than five drugs with “multi-blockbuster” potential by 2030 and generate more than 150 billion Danish kroner ($23 billion) in pipeline sales by 2035.

South Korea’s Kospi rose 1.65% to 7,007.72, while Australia’s benchmark S&P/ASX 200 was flat at 8,731.90.

Hong Kong’sHang Seng indexwas up 0.95% in the last hour of trade on Monday, while mainland China’s CSI 300 closed 0.71% higher at 4,539.56.

Japan’s markets were closed for a holiday.

— Justina Lee

European stock markets opened higher on Monday as lower oil prices and renewed focus on a potential U.S.-Iran deal helped improve sentiment.

The benchmark Stoxx 600 index was up 0.63% at 8:07 a.m. in London, following three straight losing weeks.

Most sectors were in the green, led by technology and financial stocks, while oil and gas shares retreated.

— Jenni Reid

VW share price.

Gold prices were lower early Monday, with spot gold down 0.5% to at $4,356.41 per ounce. Gold has now declined by around 1.5% in September so far, according to LSEG data.

Moves in the precious metal come amid interest rate hikes by the U.S. Federal Reserve and European Central Bank, which tend to dampen gold prices. However, investors are also monitoring falling oil prices.

Citi analysts said in a Friday note they remained bullish on gold, with a 6- to 12-month forecast of around $4,400 per ounce for spot gold.

Spot gold.

Oil fell Monday, as traders keep watch for a recovery in shipments from Saudi Arabia even after attacks by Iran-backed Houthis on Saudi Arabia with missiles and drones on Saturday.

Futures for international benchmarkBrent crudefor November delivery fell 2.07% to $101.72 a barrel. U.S.West Texas Intermediatefuturesfor October dropped 2.18% to $98.11 per barrel.

“Middle East oil flows remain surprisingly strong despite the disruption to Saudi Arabia’s East-West pipeline,” according to JPMorgan analysts in a Sept. 18 note. The total oil flows averaged 17.1 million barrels per day in the past 10 days, 6.1 million bpd below the 2025 average, it added.

Mainland China and Hong Kong shares were higher, amid mixed trading in other Asian markets.

Hong Kong’sHang Seng indexwas 0.35% higher, while mainland China’s CSI 300 added 0.64%

The gains in the Hang Seng were led by the tech and healthcare sectors, up 0.58% and 0.46% respectively.

— Justina Lee

Asia-Pacific markets traded mixed early Monday, amid worries over the ongoing Mideast conflict.

The Kospi added 0.85% at open, while the small-cap Kosdaq gained 0.43%.

Australia’s benchmark S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.49%.

Japan’s markets are closed for a holiday.

— Justina Lee

Asia-Pacific markets were set to open broadly lower on Monday, amid worries over escalating tensions in the Middle East over the weekend.

Hong KongHang Seng indexfutures were at 24,678, compared with the index’s last close of 24,750.78.

Futures for Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 last traded at 8,711, while the index closed at 8,731.20.

Japan’s markets are closed for a holiday on Monday.

Over in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia was attacked by Iran-backed Houthis with missiles and drones on Saturday. Americans were warned by the U.S. State Department toreconsider traveling to the Middle Eastas Iran and the U.S. exchanged threats to resume attacks.

— Justina Lee

Stock futures opened little changed.

Dow Jones Industrial Average futures rose by 28 points, or 0.05%. S&P 500 futures and Nasdaq-100 futures climbed 0.09% and 0.05%, respectively.

— Sarah Min