US stocks spiked on Wednesday following social media post from President Trump announcing the US and NATO “formed the framework of a future deal with respect to Greenland and, in fact, the entire Arctic Region” and called off threatened tariffs on European nations.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) jumped around 1.5%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) and the S&P 500 (^GSPC), meanwhile, each rose about 1.3% after a bruising Tuesday session that saw investors rush for the exits against a backdrop of global insecurity.
Stocks surged upward in the afternoon from earlier, smaller gains after Trump posted to Truth Social saying that he and NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte had reached a framework for a deal on Greenland and the surrounding Arctic region.
The post comes after Trump struck a less aggressive tone on Greenland in his keynote address at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, calling for “immediate negotiations” and saying that the US wouldn’t use force to gain control of the Danish territory.
In his Truth Social post, President Trump said that, due to he and Rutte’s agreeing on a deal framework, “I will not be imposing the Tariffs that were scheduled to go into effect on February 1st.” The president had threatened previously to impose 10% tariffs on European countries that did not endorse a US annexation of Greenland.
Fears over a further incensed trade war between the US and Europe had kept the “Sell America” trade alive as the EU warned again it was “fully prepared” to hit back against new tariffs.
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court heard arguments on Wednesday over the Trump administration’s removal of Lisa Cook as a Federal Reserve governor. The high court appeared skeptical over Trump’s bid to fire Cook, suggesting it could shatter the central bank’s independence and rattle markets.
On the corporate front, Netflix (NFLX) stock fell after the streaming giant’s quarterly results showed left investors unimpressed. As the season gets underway, S&P 500 companies’ earnings beats are being met by the worst share-price reactions on record, Bloomberg data shows. Wednesday brings a busy stretch of results, including reports from Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), Charles Schwab (SCHW), and other mid-sized financial institutions.
LIVE 26 updates
-
Stocks surge to session highs after Trump calls off tariffs related to Greenland
US stocks moved to session highs on Wednesday afternoon after President Trump anounced a called off tariffs against European countries related to his pursuit of Greenland.
“Based upon a very productive meeting that I have had with the Secretary General of NATO, Mark Rutte, we have formed the framework of a future deal with respect to Greenland and, in fact, the entire Arctic Region,” wrote Trump in a Truth Social post on Wednesday afternoon.
“This solution, if consummated, will be a great one for the United States of America, and all NATO Nations. Based upon this understanding, I will not be imposing the Tariffs that were scheduled to go into effect on February 1st,” he added.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) soared more than 700 points or roughly 1.6%, while the S&P 500 (^GSPC) increased more than 1.5%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) also moved to a session high.
-
Bitcoin hovers near $88,000 as Wall Street urges caution in ‘chasing rallies’
Bitcoin (BTC-USD) briefly touched $90,000 on Wednesday before falling to roughly $88,000 as President Trump offered encouragement on legislation in Congress that could catalyze crypto prices.
The token rallied 1% after Trump said he was working “to ensure America remains the crypto capital of the world.”
“Congress is working very hard on crypto market structure legislation…which I hope to sign very soon,” said Trump at the World Economic Forum in Davos.
The president’s comments raised hopes for a broader regulatory framework after the bill hit a snag last week when trading platform Coinbase (COIN) withdrew its support ahead of a key markup session.
-
Moderna, Merck stocks jump on positive cancer vaccine results
Moderna (MRNA) stock jumped 11% on Wednesday after the biotech company and Merck (MRK) announced five-year data for their personalized cancer vaccine on Tuesday that showed the treatment sustained improvements for patients. Merck stock advanced 1.8%.
According to the follow-up results, the intismeran autogene, in combination with the drug Keytruda, reduced the risk of recurrence or death by 49% in post-surgery melanoma patients compared to Keytruda alone.
“We continue to invest in our platform in oncology because of encouraging outcomes like these, which illustrate mRNA’s potential in cancer care,” said Kyle Holen, Moderna’s head of development in Oncology and Therapeutics.
Moderna stock was trading at its highest level in over a year as of midday trading. Shares have been on a tear, rallying 20% over the past five days and more than 60% since the beginning of the year.
-
Big Tech earnings put spotlight on AI and memory shortage as Trump tariff threats loom
Yahoo Finance’s Daniel Howley previews what to expect when Big Tech companies report earnings, starting with Intel’s (INTC) report after the bell on Thursday:
-
Bloomberg: SCOTUS ‘wary’ of Trump arguments to fire Lisa Cook
The Trump administration argued before the Supreme Court on Wednesday that the president’s move to fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook amid mortgage-fraud allegations should be allowed to stand.
The Court appeared skeptical, Bloomberg News reported.
Among skeptics on the bench were Trump appointees Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett.
Trump’s move to fire Cook back in the summer is just one part of his efforts to reshape the central bank, which now include a DoJ probe into Fed Chair Jay Powell’s testimony about renovations at the Fed’s headquarters.
Trump has not yet announced who he will nominate to replace Powell, whose term is up in May.
Betting markets see former Fed governor Kevin Warsh as the most likely to receive the nod from the president.
-
BlackRock analysis dismisses AI bubble fears: ‘There’s real businesses that are growing here’
BlackRock (BLK) US Head of Equity ETFs Jay Jacobs dismissed fears of an AI bubble during an interview with Yahoo Finance, pointing to the asset manager’s latest report published Wednesday on the topic.
In the event of a market bubble, Jacobs said, “the fear would be either it’s [AI is] not growing fast enough or companies are spending too much money and taking too much risk on this segment.”
“But I think both of those are not very well founded.”
He pointed to the BlackRock analysis showing AI token consumption — a broadly accepted measure of usage — growing 17-fold between December 2024 and January 2026, while noting that AI spending accounts for a smaller share of US GDP than buildouts for other technological revolutions.
Perhaps most telling: Jacobs said his team’s analysis shows earnings grew at a faster pace for the 46 AI companies in the S&P 500 in 2025 than their stock prices.
The graph above shows that earnings grew more than 30% on average for AI companies in the S&P 500, while their stock prices rose just 26%. At the same time, their valuations fell more than 5%.
For non-AI companies, share price growth outpaced earnings growth.
“If you were really worried about a bubble, what you would be implying is that valuations are getting ahead of kind of real profitability in those companies,” Jacobs said. “What we saw last year was that for AI companies, actually their valuations decreased.”
“This is not just speculative valuation expansion, but there’s real businesses that are growing here.”
-
Defense stocks rise after Trump touts US weapons in speech
Defense stocks moved higher on Wednesday after President Trump touted the US’s military power in a speech at the World Economic Forum summit in Davos.
“We make the greatest weapons in the world. But now we’re going to make them faster, much faster,” Trump said.
Trump’s remarks came ahead of a House vote on a $839 billion spending bill this week. Part of that includes President Trump’s Golden Dome missile defense project, which is slated to receive $13.4 billion in funding, and Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program, which could receive $7.6 billion for 47 aircraft.
US defense stocks, such as GE Aerospace (GE), Lockheed Martin (LMT), L3Harris Technologies (LHX), and Northrop Grumman (NOC), rose by more than 1% in late morning trading.
Earlier this month, President Trump signed an executive order prohibiting defense contractors from buying back stock or issuing dividends “until such time as they are able to produce a superior product, on time and on budget.”
“The good news is we have the greatest equipment in the world,” Trump added in his speech. “Now we’re going to start making it a lot faster. They’re going to build additional plants. And all of the money that goes into stock buybacks is going to go into building plants.”
-
‘The housing sector is not out of the woods’: Contract signings sank in December
Yahoo Finance’s Claire Boston reports:
-
Jamie Dimon declares himself a ‘globalist’ in Davos as Trump barbs linger for JPMorgan
Yahoo Finance’s David Hollerith reports:
-
Intel soars as Wall Street optimism grows ahead of earnings
Intel (INTC) shares rose 10.5% Wednesday to reach their highest level since 2022 as Wall Street analysts’ optimism over the chipmaker’s recent resurgence grew ahead of its quarterly earnings report Thursday.
Bernstein analyst Stacy Rasgon raised his price target on shares slightly to $36 from $35 Wednesday, noting “positive market dynamics” in the data center server space but noting that its manufacturing business as “quite a ways to go.”
Rasgon’s bumped-up outlook comes a day after Intel stock got two upgrades from HSBC analyst Frank Lee and Seaport’s Jay Goldberg.
Lee changed his rating to Hold from Reduce, citing greater demand for CPUs — central processing units, or more traditional computing chips made by Intel that are used alongside AI chips — from data centers due to agentic AI. Meanwhile, Goldberg upgraded shares to Buy from Neutral, pointing to “strong signals” for Intel’s PC chips and an “improving outlook” for its manufacturing business.
-
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang: ‘Trillions of dollars of AI infrastructure needs to be built’
Yahoo Finance’s Dan Howley reports:
-
Trump doubles down on credit card interest rate cap in Davos speech
Speaking at the World Economic Forum’s Davos summit on Wednesday, President Trump doubled down on his push to bring down credit card interest rates.
“I’m asking Congress to cap credit card interest rates at 10% for one year, and this will help millions of Americans save for a home,” Trump said in his speech.
American credit card issuers currently charge interest rates of “28%, 30%, 31%, 32%,” Trump said, forcing citizens to “[lose] their house” after getting a “little late on their payment.”
Trump claimed that the profit margin for credit card companies “now exceeds 50%.”
Speaking at the Davos summit earlier in the week, JPMorgan Chase CEO (JPM) Jamie Dimon said a 10% interest rate cap would cause “economic disaster” in the US and force banks to cancel credit lines for a large swath of Americans.
The credit card interest rate cap is part of a larger push by Trump for housing affordability. During his comments at Davos, Trump called out his executive order banning “large institutional investors” from buying single-family homes.
“America will not become a nation of renters, we’re not going to do that,” Trump said. “It’s just not fair to the public.”
-
Stocks climb at the open
US stocks rose at the market open on Wednesday as President Trump eased his tone on Greenland in a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) climbed 0.4%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite(^IXIC) rose 0.3%. The S&P 500 (^GSPC) also added 0.4%, coming off a bruising Tuesday session that saw investors rush for the exits against a backdrop of boiling geopolitical tensions.
Trump’s administration is seeking to take over the strategically located, mineral-rich Arctic territory of Denmark, risking its alliance with European nations and putting markets on edge.
-
Stock futures rebound after Trump says he won’t use ‘excessive strength and force’ in Greenland
Stock futures rebounded after President Trump reiterated his demand for the US to take possession of Greenland but said he wouldn’t use force to acquire the Arctic territory.
“We probably won’t get anything unless I decide to use excessive strength and force, where we would be, frankly, unstoppable, but I won’t do that,” Trump told the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
Trump said he’s seeking “immediate negotiations” to discuss the US taking full ownership of Greenland, which he described as a “very small ask.” Trump did not repeat his Greenland-related tariff threats that upended markets on Tuesday.
Dow, Nasdaq, and S&P 500 futures turned positive after all three indexes were lower earlier in the morning.
-
Kraft Heinz stock sinks as Berkshire Hathaway considers selling 325 million shares
Kraft Heinz (KHC) may be the target of the first major move by Warren Buffett’s successor, Greg Abel.
On Tuesday, Kraft Heinz said that Berkshire Hathaway (BRK-B, BRK-A) may begin selling its 325 million shares in the food company, according to a regulatory filing. Kraft Heinz stock dropped more than 6% on Wednesday morning.
In 2015, Buffett and 3G Capital formed Kraft Heinz by merging the two food brands. But Berkshire hasn’t been quite as happy with the direction the company has taken as of late.
According to the AP, Berkshire took a $3.76 billion writedown on its Kraft-Heinz stake last summer, and Buffett said last fall that he was disappointed in Kraft Heinz’s plan to split the company in two.
On Jan. 1, Buffett stepped down from the conglomerate he founded, and Abel took over the running of Berkshire Hathaway.
-
Netflix stock drops after reporting earnings, offering to buy for Warner Bros. in all cash
Netflix stock (NFLX) tumbled more than 5% in premarket trading on Wednesday after the streaming giant beat quarterly earnings estimates but said it would ramp up spending on content and pause its stock buyback program.
Hanging over Netflix’s fourth quarter report was the company’s acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD), which has faced bitter competition from Paramount Skydance (PSKY). On Tuesday, Netflix sweetened its deal by offering to buy the company in all cash.
While the deal is likely to face regulatory scruiNetflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos sounded confident in the deal’s approval, saying, “We’ve already made progress towards securing the necessary regulatory approvals.”
The streaming giant reported revenue of $12.05 billion, compared to Wall Street estimates for $11.96 billion, per Bloomberg consensus data.
Earnings per share came in slightly higher than expected at $0.56, versus the Street’s forecast of $0.55.
-
Premarket trending tickers: Kraft Heinz, United, and Ardagh
Kraft Heinz (KHC) stock fell 5% before the bell on Wednesday after news was released that Berkshire Hathaway’s new CEO, Greg Abel, may be considering selling its 325 million shares in the food giant.
United Airlines (UAL) stock rose 3% before the bell on Wednesday after reporting fourth quarter earnings that beat estimates.
Ardagh Metal Packaging stock rose 7% during premarket hours today. Analysts at BMO Capital upgraded the stock to Outperform.
-
The bond market is starting to speak up again
Treasury yields continued to sell off on Wednesday morning, pushing yields higher as the Greenland turmoil unnerved markets. The 10-year yield (^TNX) rose 6 basis points to 4.29% in premarket trading, while the 30-year yield (^TYX) rose 8 basis points to 4.92%.
As Yahoo Finance’s Hamza Shaban writes in today’s Morning Brief Takeaway, the US’s geopolitical fight over Greenland highlighted the sensitivity of the bond market:
-
S&P 500 profit beats draw worst stock price reaction on record
S&P 500 (^GSPC) companies are handily beating earnings estimates, yet unimpressed investors are delivering the worst share-price reactions on record as the outlook for 2026 turns murky.
While it’s still early days, data compiled by Bloomberg Intelligence show about 81% of S&P 500 firms have beaten fourth-quarter profit expectations so far. However, their shares have trailed the benchmark by an average of 1.1 percentage points — the worst relative performance across data going back to 2017.
Among the stocks that underwhelmed, 3M Co.’s (MMM) shares fell 7% on Tuesday even as the company topped profit estimates, with investors focusing instead on a glum forecast. State Street Corp. (STT) dropped 6.1% as a dimmer net interest income outlook overshadowed better-than-expected quarterly results. Netflix Inc. (NFLX) also declined about 6% in premarket trading Wednesday after a disappointing outlook.
The trend emphasizes just how high the stakes are for corporate earnings this quarter as US stocks kicked off the year scaling record highs. That’s lifted valuations above long-term averages just as analysts have been cutting profit estimates ahead of the reporting season.
“Beating consensus isn’t the hurdle right now. The hurdle is raising the forward path enough to justify already rich valuations in a market that’s still sensitive to rates and policy uncertainty,” said Aneeka Gupta, macroeconomic research director at WisdomTree. “In that environment, a beat without strong guidance becomes a ‘sell-the-news’ event.”
-
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang on job risk from AI
Jensen has talked about this topic many times, but always good to hear his latest thinking.
He is seeing a “boom” in trade jobs, six figure salaries, helping to build out AI infrastructure.
“Everyone should be able to make a great living,” Huang said.