US Stock Market Close: Nvidia, Tesla Both Rise Over 4%, Chinese Concept Stocks Outperform the Broader Market

On Wednesday (May 14), the three major U.S. stock indices had mixed performances. The Dow Jones Industrial Average declined, the S&P 500 struggled to break a three-day winning streak, while the Nasdaq extended its gains for a sixth consecutive day.

By the closing bell, the S&P 500 turned positive in the final minutes of trading, closing up 0.1% at 5,892.58 points, marking its third straight day of gains, after recovering all its losses for the year the previous day. The Nasdaq Composite Index rose 0.72% to close at 19,146.81 points, extending its winning streak to six days.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.21% to close at 42,051.06 points. Among its components, Merck & Co. (-4.12%) and Amgen (-3.02%) led the declines, weighing on the index's performance. Since Trump signed an executive order to lower drug prices, multinational pharmaceutical companies have underperformed the broader market.

Similar to the previous day's trading, technology stocks remained the primary driver of the broader market. Nvidia extended its gains, closing up 4.16%, with its market capitalization returning to $3.3 trillion. The previous day, Jensen Huang announced in Riyadh that Nvidia would sell over 18,000 artificial intelligence chips to Saudi Arabia-based company Humain.

Nvidia's rival, AMD, rose 4.68% after the company also reached a $10 billion strategic cooperation agreement with Humain. Before today's market open, AMD's board of directors also approved a new $6 billion share repurchase program.

Driven by these developments, the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index closed up 0.6%, narrowing its year-to-date loss to 0.39%. The Nasdaq 100 Index rose 0.57%, accumulating a 3.27% gain over the past three trading days this week and a 1.46% increase year-to-date.

Earlier this week, high-level economic and trade talks between China and the United States reached important consensus and made substantive progress, directly reflected in a significant reduction in bilateral tariff levels. Financial markets responded positively, and risk appetite in the U.S. stock market also increased.

Adam Turnquist, Chief Technical Strategist at LPL Financial, commented, "Macro policy uncertainty has become higher, with many unknowns remaining, but 'for now, investors have accepted the backdrop of trade easing.'"

Mark Hackett, Chief Market Strategist at Nationwide, said that investors are returning to fundamentals, but they may not be pleased with the current situation, as "the market has surged from oversold to overbought in record time."

Hackett added, "Unless we see a significant acceleration in economic growth, this will limit upside potential in the near term."

Performance of Popular Stocks

Large-cap technology stocks had mixed performances. (Ranked by market capitalization) Microsoft rose 0.85%, Nvidia rose 4.16%, Apple fell 0.28%, Amazon fell 0.53%, Alphabet Class C rose 3.68%, Meta rose 0.51%, and Broadcom fell 0.13%.

Tesla rose by 4.07%, and Elon Musk held talks with the Governor of Qatar Central Bank and the Chairman of Qatar Investment Authority. Additionally, data showed that Tesla's Shanghai Gigafactory exported nearly 30,000 Model 3 and Model Y car models in April this year, hitting a new high in nearly a year.

Among Chinese ADRs, the Nasdaq Golden Dragon China Index rose by 1.17%, outperforming the broader US stock market.

Most popular Chinese ADRs rose, with Tencent Music Entertainment Group up by 15.66%, Li Auto up by 2.72%, New Oriental Education & Technology Group up by 2.45%, Alibaba Group Holding up by 1.82%, TAL Education Group up by 1.7%, Baidu up by 1.55%, XPeng Motors up by 0.67%, and NIO up by 0.24%.

Pinduoduo fell by 0.47%, JD.com fell by 4.08%, and Legend Biotech fell by 10.55%.

Corporate News

[US and Qatar Sign Economic and Military Cooperation Agreements Worth Over $243.5 Billion]

The US White House issued a statement on the 14th, saying that the US and Qatar signed multiple agreements worth over $243.5 billion on the same day, including projects such as Qatar's purchase of Boeing passenger planes and armed drones from the US. The statement said that Qatar Airways signed contracts worth $96 billion with US-based Boeing and GE Aerospace to purchase up to 210 Boeing 787 Dreamliners and Boeing 777X aircraft. In the military field, the two sides signed multiple defense cooperation agreements, including Qatar's purchase of MQ-9B armed drones worth nearly $2 billion and anti-drone weapon systems worth about $1 billion from the US. In addition, US and Qatari companies also signed multiple cooperation agreements involving energy infrastructure and high-tech development.

[Apple Reportedly Plans to Add Eye-Tracking Scroll Function to Vision Pro Headset]

Apple is developing a new feature for the Vision Pro headset that allows users to browse content by rolling their eyes, aiming to further enhance the device's interactive experience. According to people familiar with the matter, this eye-tracking scroll function is being tested in visionOS 3, the latest version of the upcoming operating system for the Vision Pro headset. The sources said that Apple hopes to leverage the existing eye-tracking hardware and software of the Vision Pro to further advance the system. Apple plans to unveil the new Vision Pro operating system at its annual developers' conference starting on June 9.

[Ford Recalls Approximately 274,000 SUVs Due to Safety Concerns]

Ford Motor Company announced that it is recalling approximately 274,000 Expedition and Lincoln Navigator SUVs across the US due to issues that may cause the vehicles to lose braking function while driving, increasing the risk of collisions.

[AMD Announces New $6 Billion Share Repurchase Program]

AMD announced today that its board of directors has approved a new $6 billion share repurchase program. The new authorization supplements the remaining balance of approximately $4 billion under its existing share repurchase program as of March 29, 2025, bringing the total current repurchase authorization to approximately $10 billion.

[Roche Warns of Reconsidering US Investments Due to Trump's Drug Pricing Order]

Swiss pharmaceutical company Roche stated that if US President Trump implements an executive order to reduce prescription drug costs, the company will need to reconsider its planned investments in the US. Roche announced last month that it plans to invest $50 billion in the US pharmaceutical and diagnostics sectors over the next five years, creating over 12,000 job opportunities. Roche expects the executive order to have no impact on its business this year but stated that it will undermine the US's position as the world's leading pharmaceutical and healthcare ecosystem, stifle US economic growth, and lead to job losses.

[Alibaba Open-Sources Tongyi Wanxiang Wan2.1-VACE, a Video Generation and Editing Model]

Alibaba has officially open-sourced Tongyi Wanxiang Wan2.1-VACE, a model that supports video generation and editing. A single model can simultaneously support a full range of basic generation and editing capabilities, including text-to-video generation, image-referenced video generation, video inpainting, local video editing, video background extension, and video duration extension. A reporter from the Science and Technology Innovation Board Daily learned that two versions, 1.3B and 14B, have been open-sourced, with the 1.3B version capable of running on consumer-grade graphics cards.

[Cisco Reports Q3 Revenue of $14.15 Billion, Exceeding Market Expectations]

Cisco reported Q3 revenue of $14.15 billion, compared to analysts' expectations of $14.05 billion. The company expects full-year revenue to be in the range of $56.5 billion to $56.7 billion, up from its original forecast of $56 billion to $56.5 billion. It expects Q4 adjusted EPS to be in the range of $0.96 to $0.98, compared to analysts' expectations of $0.95. The quarterly dividend remains unchanged at 41¢, in line with analysts' expectations.

[CoreWeave Reports Net Loss of Over $300 Million in Q1, Shares Rise 6% After Hours]

CoreWeave released its first earnings report since its US IPO. Q1 revenue was $981.6 million. Q1 net loss was $314.6 million, with an adjusted net loss of $149.6 million. The Q1 adjusted EBITDA margin was 62%, and the loss per share was $1.49. The company's shares rose over 6% in after-hours trading on the US stock market.

[Bridgewater Buys Alibaba Aggressively in Q1, Establishes Positions in JD.com and Gold ETFs]

Bridgewater Associates has released its Q1 holdings report (13F) as of March 31 this year. In terms of increasing holdings, Bridgewater bought over 5.4 million shares of Alibaba, with a staggering 21-fold increase MoM, directly catapulting it to become the fourth-largest holding. Additionally, it purchased 1.88 million shares of Baidu (a 956% increase), 320,000 shares of Apple, 400,000 shares of Amazon, nearly 500,000 shares of Pinduoduo, and 1.3 million units of the Core MSCI Emerging Markets ETF-iShares, among others. In terms of establishing new positions, Bridgewater bought 1.1 million units of the SPDR Gold Shares ETF in Q1, making it the sixth-largest holding, and newly acquired 2.78 million shares of JD.com. In terms of reducing holdings, Bridgewater cut its largest holding, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY), by nearly 60%, reduced its holdings in Nvidia by 18.74% (650,000 shares), Meta by 31.47% (195,000 shares), and Google by 16% (578,000 shares), significantly slashed its position in Robinhood by 80%, and fully liquidated its positions in Lyft and Rivian, among others. As of March 31 this year, Bridgewater's total assets under management stood at $21.6 billion, up 1.47% QoQ.