Matt Britzman, senior equity analyst, Hargreaves Lansdown: “Global equity markets look set for a mixed start, with FTSE 100 futures pointing to an essentially flat open while US markets are expected to give back a little ground after the S&P 500 chalked up yet another record high last night. The latest moves suggest investors are still happy to chase the AI theme, with some profit-taking in software names after a strong run and money rotating back into the trusty hardware plays. The market tone is still broadly upbeat, despite oil prices ticking higher as investors try to make heads or tails of what’s going on in the Middle East, with news of fresh strikes balanced with President Trump’s insistence that talks are still ongoing.
Nvidia used one of the chip industry’s biggest annual showcases, Taiwan’s Computex conference, to underline a familiar point: the AI hardware race still runs through its technology. The key message was around AI factory economics, with Vera Rubin moving into full production and Nvidia arguing that lower running costs, faster output and longer useful life can matter more than headline chip prices. RTX Spark added another strand to the story, pushing Nvidia further into AI PCs with a Blackwell GPU and custom Grace-based CPU, though this is an incremental opportunity rather than a main driver. The bigger picture is that Nvidia is trying to show it can stretch beyond data centre GPUs without losing focus on the core engine of demand, and all signs point to a company executing on that strategy.
Gold’s been out of the spotlight of late, struggling to regain its shine, with prices holding below $4,500 an ounce. Stronger US jobs data didn’t help, denting hopes of near-term rate cuts. A jump in US job openings and a drop in layoffs point to a labour market that still has plenty of heat in it, giving the Federal Reserve more reason to keep interest rates higher for longer. Attention will now turn to Friday’s non-farm payrolls report as the next indication of where the rate path might be headed.
Oil prices are slowly climbing, with Brent moving above $97 a barrel as fresh Middle East tensions added another layer of risk to supply expectations. Reports of Iranian missile launches and US retaliatory strikes kept the geopolitical premium firmly in place, even as President Trump insisted talks with Iran are still active. There was a tighter supply angle too, with industry data pointing to a 6.8 million barrel drop in US crude inventories last week, which would mark a sixth straight weekly draw if confirmed by official figures later today.”
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