U.S. stock futures trended higher on Thursday morning, as investors focused on the September quarter earnings season as well as the artificial intelligence (AI) boom, looking beyond the escalating trade tensions with China and the government shutdown at home. Futures on the Nasdaq 100 (NDX), the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), and the S&P 500 Index (SPX) were up 0.58%, 0.16%, and 0.39%, respectively, at 8:15 a.m. EST on October 16.
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In Wednesday’s regular trading session, major stock indices saw choppy trading. The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite closed higher by 0.4% and 0.66%, respectively, while the Dow Jones was down 0.04%.
Coming to trending stocks, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSM) stock was up 2% in Thursday’s pre-market trading, as the company reported a 39% jump in its Q3 earnings, driven by robust demand for its AI chips. Meanwhile, Salesforce (CRM) stock jumped 6%, as the software company announced a $60 billion revenue target by 2030. In contrast, Hewlett Packard (HPE) stock was down 9.6% as of writing, after the tech company announced a weaker-than-expected Fiscal 2026 outlook.
Meanwhile, memory chipmaker Micron (MU) jumped 6% in pre-market trading on bullish comments from UBS. However, Nio (NIO) stock plunged more than 7% as Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund, GIC, sued the Chinese electric vehicle (EV) maker for allegedly inflating revenue and misleading investors.
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