Stock Indexes Close Lower as Investors Assess CPI Inflation Data, JPMorgan Earnings; Dow Sheds 400 Points

AI Could Spell Trouble for Software Stocks

FROM 1 hr 51 min ago

Software was once the hottest industry on Wall Street. Not so in the AI era.

S&P 500 software stocks lagged the broader index for the second consecutive year in 2025 as companies making the “picks and shovels” of the AI buildout—like semiconductors and memory devices—led the stock market higher. And analysts expect the challenges weighing on software stocks, especially application developers, to persist in 2026.

One example: Oppenheimer on Tuesday downgraded Adobe (ADBE) stock to “Perform” from “Outperform” and withdrew its price target entirely, citing threats from AI that apply to varying degrees across the application software industry. The news pulled Adobe, shares of which have lost more than a fifth of their value over the past 12 months, down more than 5% on Tuesday.

One of the primary issues Adobe faces, according to Oppenheimer, is the perception that AI is weakening its competitive position. Gen AI “is increasing the velocity of content creation while lowering price and subscriber growth,” wrote analysts led by Brian Schwartz. The company faces new competition from LLM providers like OpenAI and advertising platforms like Meta, which have introduced creative tools that allow people other options for doing what previously required an Adobe license and specialized knowledge. 

Investors also worry that generative AI could upend the seat-based pricing model on which many software-as-a-service providers like Adobe are built. Traditionally, Adobe sells a client a set number of Creative Cloud licenses for a set amount of time, which has meant reliable revenue. It and other software companies will have to adapt if the usage-based pricing—in which a customer pays each time they use a service—favored by AI developers and hyperscalers becomes the norm. 

Read the full article here.

–Colin Laidley

Delta’s President Expects Main Cabin Airfares to Climb. ‘The Math Has to Work.’

FROM 3 hr 48 min ago

Basic airfares may not stay at current prices for long.

The price of domestic, main cabin seats will likely increase as air carriers adjust to remain viable, Delta Air Line (DAL) President Glen Hauenstein said. Airlines, including Delta, are losing money on the act of transporting passengers, instead profiting from ancillary services, such as co-branded credit cards. And losses tend to be larger in the main cabin, so carriers focused on that segment are under more pressure than Delta, Hauenstein said on a conference call about the company’s fourth-quarter results.

“At some point, this is going to shift,” Hauenstein said Tuesday, according to a transcript made available by AlphaSense. “That’s just how the math has to work.”

Delta’s fourth-quarter earnings came in slightly below analysts’ expectations, and the carrier released a more restrained profit forecast than Wall Street anticipated.

Bookings hit a weekly record in early January, with premium ticket and business travel picking up, Delta CEO Ed Bastian said. Still, a number of developments have made tracking travel demand difficult, including caps on flight traffic during the government shutdown in November and recent storms, the company said.

Sales have been sluggish for the low-cost seats often purchased by those on a budget, Delta and other carriers have said, while purchases of first-class and international tickets have held up as wealthier Americans’ appear less sensitive to economic pressure. Delta’s “premium” ticket revenue hit $5.7 billion in the fourth-quarter, topping the $5.6 billion from basic tickets.

Read the full article here.

–Sarina Trangle

AMD, Intel Pop After a Pair of Upgrades. Here’s Why One Wall Street Bull Likes the Stocks

FROM 3 hr 48 min ago

A pair of chipmakers were among the top performers in the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Tuesday after the stocks won fresh bullish calls on Wall Street.

Shares of Intel (INTC) were up nearly 9%, and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) surged over 6% in recent trading even as broader markets declined, after KeyBanc analysts upgraded the stocks to “overweight,” citing stronger-than-expected demand for the chipmakers’ AI products.

The analysts said their research suggests both chipmakers have “largely sold out” of their expected 2026 capacity for server CPUs used in data centers. Both are also considering raising their prices by 10% to 15% thanks to the overwhelming demand, the analysts said.

The analysts raised their estimates for how much Intel and AMD could ship this year, and said that their evaluation of Intel’s new “18A” production method was “enough to convince us it could credibly be the #2 foundry supplier in the industry,” behind Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSM).

Read the full article here.

–Aaron McDade

Salesforce Is Worst-Performing Stock in S&P 500 Today

FROM 5 hr 7 min ago

Salesforce (CRM) shares had been steadily declining over the past year. Today’s product release did not change their course.

The cloud-based software firm’s stock led S&P 500 decliners Tuesday, dropping roughly 6.5% in recent trading following an update to its virtual assistant Slackbot feature in Slack.

Slackbot will available to Salesforce’s Business+ and Enterprise+ customers through a phased rollout beginning today and continuing through February, the San Francisco-based company said.

“This brings AI that is grounded in your company’s data, workflows, and Slack conversations, right into the flow of work,” Salesforce co-founder and CTO Parker Harris said. “It is the crucial step to realizing the future we’ve been building toward —bringing Agentforce 360 to life with an intuitive, conversational interface, and elevating every human with enterprise-grade AI.”

Salesforce shares have lost nearly a quarter of their value over the past year.

Hoping to Receive Trump’s $2,000 Tariff Rebate Check? You May Have to Wait a Bit Longer

FROM 5 hr 7 min ago

Tariff rebate checks for Americans worth $2,000 each are still on the agenda, according to President Donald Trump, but they may be coming months later than previously thought. Trump also believes he may not need an OK from Congress to send the checks, potentially making it easier to overcome lawmaker opposition to the program.

“That’s coming in, that I’ll be able to do $2,000 sometime. I would say toward the end of the year,” Trump said in an interview with The New York Times published Sunday.

In early November, Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform that he would distribute a $2,000 tariff “dividend” to Americans from the revenues generated by tariffs. Trump has said that the tariff rebate checks would be restricted to low- and middle-income earners, which Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has speculated could be limited to people with incomes of no more than $100,000. 

Trump in mid-November told reporters that the checks would be issued “somewhere prior to probably in the middle of next year, a little bit later than that.”

Read the full article here.

–Terry Lane

Moderna Leads S&P 500 Gainers on Raised 2025 Sales Projection

FROM 5 hr 57 min ago

Moderna’s (MRNA) chief executive delivered positive news at the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference yesterday. Investors are buying the stock today.

Shares of the Cambridge, Mass.-based biotechnology firm soared nearly 16% to easily pace S&P 500 gainers Tuesday, a day after Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel revealed a raised 2025 sales forecast at the conference.

“We should land around the $1.9 billion of sales for the year, which is $100 million better than the midpoint” of Moderna’s prior guidance of $1.6 billion to $2.0 billion, Bancel said, according to a transcript provided by AlphaSense.

With Tuesday’s sharp gains, Moderna shares moved into positive territory over the past year.

Near Retirement and Recently Laid Off? See How to Protect Your Savings and Financial Future

FROM 6 hr 36 min ago

If you’ve just been laid off and retirement is around the corner, it may be stressful, especially if you were looking to save more before leaving the workforce. While you may feel powerless after a layoff, you still have options.

With the right financial moves, you can protect your nest egg, reduce stress, and build a bridge towards retirement that will help you realize your long-term goals.

The first move after being laid off is to step back and absorb what happened. Resist the urge to panic and start withdrawing funds from your retirement account.

“You have to address the emotional part first before you can get into any numbers or findings,” says Crystal Cox, CFP and SVP at Wealthspire Advisors. “Things might look a little bit different, it’s a shift in perspective, but you will be ok.”

Start by assessing your entire financial profile: How much do you have in savings? What expenses can you cut out or cut back on? Is your company providing severance? For how long? Can you claim unemployment? Are there other sources of support available to you?

The goal is to optimize your cash flow before you start using long-term savings. You may even need to take on part-time work or consulting jobs to cover any holes in your finances. This may help you delay withdrawing retirement funds or claiming Social Security. These strategies can add up to thousands of dollars in the long run.

Read the full article here.

–Ali Hussain

Trump’s Credit Card Interest Rate Cap Could Mean ‘Diminished’ Rewards, Points and Miles

FROM 6 hr 50 min ago

The president’s proposal to cap credit-card interest rates could mean upheaval for rewards aficionados, an expert told Investopedia.

President Donald Trump’s idea—to cap rates at 10%—might mean relief for some card users but also substantially limit access to credit for many Americans with lower credit scores. (Trump on Friday wrote on Truth Social that “Effective January 20, 2026, I, as President of the United States, am calling for a one year cap on Credit Card Interest Rates of 10%.”) Doing so, meanwhile, “would be a chaotic contraction of the rewards ecosystem,” according to expert Tiffany Funk.  

Funk, the co-founder of the flight rewards platform point.me, says Trump’s proposal would have a massive impact on points and miles.

“The reality is that these great bank rewards programs are made possible in part by the interest and other fees,” Funk says. “Banks aren’t going to lose money if they can avoid it, so I would expect we’d see a significant shift in program economics: perhaps fewer cards, with higher fees, catering to narrower cohorts of customers, and diminished rewards.”

Read the full article here.

Travere Therapeutics Stock Plunges as FDA Requests More Information About Kidney-Disorder Drug

FROM 8 hr 18 min ago

Shares of Travere Therapeutics (TVTX) lost roughly a third of their value Tuesday after the biopharmaceutical said the U.S. Food and Drug Administration requested additional information about its treatment for a rare kidney disorder.

San Diego-based Travere, which has a market capitalization of about $2 billion, said it “recently received additional information requests from the FDA to further characterize the clinical benefit of FILSPARI and recently submitted responses to address the Agency’s questions, which are currently under review by the Agency.”

Travere added that if approved, Filspari, or sparsentan, “would be the first and only medication approved for FSGS, a rare kidney disorder and a leading cause of kidney failure.”

Even with today’s stark declines, shares of Travere Therapeutics are up about 25% over the past year.

A Deal With the Pentagon and Planned Spin-Off Has This Defense Stock at Record Highs

FROM 8 hr 31 min ago

L3Harris (LHX) shares are rising to fresh highs Tuesday, thanks to a show of support from the U.S. government.

The shares were up about 3% at $350 Tuesday morning, leaving the shares on track to top Monday’s record close after the defense contractor said it plans to spin off one of its divisions with backing from the federal government.

The U.S. government will invest $1 billion in L3Harris’ missile solutions business that will convert to equity once it has debuted on the public market in the second half of this year, the company said. L3Harris will retain a controlling stake in the business.

Read the full article here.

–Aaron McDade

Has Inflation Peaked? Some Key Consumer Prices Rose Less Than Expected in December

FROM 9 hr 30 min ago

A key measure of inflation rose less than expected in December, offering some relief to household budgets strained by years of steep cost-of-living increases.

The Consumer Price Index rose 2.7% in December, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said Tuesday. That was the same annual increase as in November and matched forecaster expectations according to a survey of economists by Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal. However, the core reading, which excludes the volatile prices for food and gas, rose 2.6% over the year, coming in less the median forecast for 2.8%.

Inflation is still running above the Federal Reserve’s goal of a 2% annual rate, but flat inflation is an improvement over 2025. The annual CPI reading climbed between April and September of last year, with economists largely attributing the price hikes to President Donald Trump’s tariff campaign.

“Americans have waited for a long time since the pandemic, and now they’re starting to get relief on prices,” David Russell, global head of market strategy at TradeStation, wrote in a commentary.

Read the full article here.

–Diccon Hyatt

Here Are the ‘Hazards’ Jamie Dimon Thinks Loom Over the U.S. Economy

FROM 9 hr 51 min ago

The U.S. economy is “resilient,” JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon said Tuesday, but investors should remain wary of a range of possible “hazards” ahead.

Dimon’s comments came as the big U.S. bank turned in quarterly financial results that included higher four-quarter net revenue and a year-over-year drop in net income. Big-bank numbers mark the unofficial start of the latest earnings season, with stocks sitting around record levels.

“Markets seem to underappreciate the potential hazards,” JPMorgan’s (JPM) Dimon said in a statement accompanying the earnings report, noting “complex geopolitical conditions, the risk of sticky inflation and elevated asset prices.” Dimon has for some time cited risks he sees the economy facing, early last year warning of persistent inflation and a “dangerous” geopolitical backdrop.

Read the full article here.

–David Marino-Nachison

Mortgage Rates Just Dropped to a 15-Month Low. Is It Time to Jump on a Rate Lock?

FROM 11 hr 9 min ago

If you’ve been keeping an eye on mortgage rates, this week may have finally felt like a small break. After hovering at higher levels for much of the past year, rates on 30-year fixed mortgages for new home purchases have been slowly drifting lower in recent weeks, pushing the national average down as far as 6.23% mid-day on Monday.

That’s the lowest 30-year average homebuyers have seen since early October 2024. As the chart below shows, mortgage rates spent much of the past year near higher levels, topping 7% at several points before beginning a gradual pullback.

For buyers who have been waiting on the sidelines, today’s reading offers some welcome relief. But predicting where rates go from here is difficult. Mortgage rates can shift quickly in response to new economic data, changes in investor sentiment, or broader market moves—and similar moments in the past haven’t always led to the same outcome.

That uncertainty is why many buyers face the same question when rates reach a low point: wait for clearer signals, or lock in what’s available today.

Read the full article here.

–Sabrina Karl

How Childhood Hardship Can Cut Retirement Wealth by 50%

FROM 11 hr 42 min ago

Enduring childhood abuse or a parental divorce often has negative consequences for a person’s wealth later in life, says a recent report from the Center for Retirement Research (CRR) at Boston College. And that can have a big impact on retirement security.

In the December 2025 study, CRR researchers found that facing adverse childhood experiences (ACEs)—like emotional neglect, household mental illness, or alcoholism—resulted in people aged 52 to 60 having a net worth that was substantially lower than those who did not.

Analyzing data from a longitudinal survey spanning from 1979 to 2018 of more than 12,500 people, the researchers found that the median net wealth of people who did not have such adverse experiences during childhood was $110,000, while those who did had a net worth that was 44% to 77% lower.

The researchers controlled for both parental income and education.

Read the full article here.

–Trina Paul

DOJ’s Powell Probe Has People Asking One Big Question: What Happens to Interest Rates?

FROM 12 hours ago

The Justice Department (DOJ) has opened a criminal probe involving Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, an unusual development arriving just weeks before the Fed’s next interest rate decision. If you’re seeing those headlines and wondering whether they could affect what the Fed does next, it’s a fair question.

Fed rate decisions shape everyday finances, influencing both the return savers earn on cash in the bank and the costs borrowers pay on variable-rate debt such as a credit card balance. Whether this latest news has any bearing on interest rates depends largely on how the Fed’s decision-making process works—and whether there’s any reason to expect that process to change.

Despite the DOJ news, market expectations for the Fed’s next move have remained largely unchanged. Investors are still pricing in little chance that the Fed will cut interest rates at its upcoming meeting, with the central bank set to announce its decision on Jan. 28. Futures pricing currently puts the probability of a January rate cut at only 5%, roughly where it stood before the DOJ probe became public.

Expectations climb for rate cuts at later Fed meetings, as shown in the chart below. But current market pricing suggests that it may take until the June meeting for the Fed’s benchmark rate to be lowered by at least a quarter point.

Read the full article here.

–Sabrina Karl

Delta Stock Drops as Profit Forecasts Disappoint

FROM 12 hr 34 min ago

Delta Air Lines (DAL) forecast fiscal 2026 adjusted profit growth of 20% at the midpoint of its range. Investors were looking for more.

Shares of the Atlanta-based carrier fell nearly 6% before the bell after it guided for full-year adjusted earnings per share of $6.50 to $7.50. The midpoint of the range was well below the $7.26 consensus forecast of analysts polled by Visible Alpha. It also projected current-quarter adjusted EPS of $0.50 to $0.90, with the midpoint below the $0.72 consensus.

Delta, the largest U.S. airline by revenue, also reported slightly disappointing fiscal 2025 fourth-quarter profit of $1.55, which missed the Visible Alpha estimate by a penny. Operating revenue of $16.00 billion topped the consensus projection of $15.75 billion.

For its fiscal 2025 year, Delta made $5 billion in profit on more than $63 billion in operating revenue—strongly aided by remuneration growth of 11% to $8.2 billion from credit card partner American Express (AXP)—yet it once again lost money flying passengers. It registered a lower passenger revenue per available seat mile (PRASM), 17.37 cents, than cost per available seat mile (CASM), 19.31 cents, a slightly worse ratio than in 2024.

On the plus side, Delta announced it had reached a deal with Boeing (BA) to purchase 30 787-10 widebody aircraft, with options for 30 more, with deliveries scheduled to begin in 2031. 

“Delta is building the fleet for the future, enhancing the customer experience, driving operational improvements and providing steady replacements for less efficient, older aircraft in the decade to come,” Delta CEO Ed Bastian said.

Stock Futures Point Lower Ahead of CPI Inflation Data, Bank Earnings

FROM 13 hr 16 min ago

Futures contracts associated with the Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 0.1%.

S&P 500 futures also were down 0.1%.

Nasdaq 100 futures pointed 0.3% lower.