[New York Stock Market] 'Jensen Huang Scandal' Fallout Persists... Only Dow Rises as Stocks End Mixed

Dow closes up 0.1%
S&P 500 falls 0.4%, Nasdaq drops 0.9%

Major U.S. stock indexes closed mixed on Friday, November 13, local time, as fallout from the scandal involving former NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang continued.

On the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.10%, or 50.46 points, from the previous session to close at 52,347.55. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index fell 0.40%, or 30.73 points, to 7,561.67, while the Nasdaq Composite dropped 0.91%, or 229.82 points, to 25,136.27.

Former NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang. EPA-Yonhap News

U.S. stocks initially rose that day. Concerns that the Federal Reserve (Fed) would sharply raise its benchmark interest rate eased after the U.S. Department of Labor reported that the Producer Price Index (PPI) rose 0.3% in October from the previous month. The October PPI increase was below the market forecast of 0.4%. However, the index rose 6.5% from a year earlier, its biggest increase since November 2022.

NVIDIA shares weighed on the broader market. The stock closed down 2.01% that day, taking the company's market capitalization below $4 trillion. The shares have continued to decline as the scandal involving former CEO Huang has fueled concerns about a leadership vacuum at NVIDIA and regulatory uncertainty.

Market participants expected Huang's resignation to prompt further share-price adjustments. Major investment banks, including HSBC, lowered their price targets, saying the stock could remain stagnant for some time until a succession plan becomes clearer.

Thomas Martin of Globalt Investments told CNBC that finding a new CEO would take NVIDIA considerable time, which he expected to further increase uncertainty about the company's future. Ross Mayfield of Baird said the scandal had already left a deep mark on the market and that volatility was likely to remain high. He also expected investors to shift funds into areas beyond artificial intelligence (AI), regardless of NVIDIA's situation.

NVIDIA's decline appeared to be spreading across the technology sector. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index fell 3.43%. AMD and Broadcom, NVIDIA's competitors, which had surged the previous day, plunged 8.75% and 4.76%, respectively.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.