Financial Markets                      06/08 09:34

   

   NEW YORK (AP) -- Wall Street is clawing back some of its steep losses from 
Friday, as stocks swept up in the artificial-intelligence boom bounce back on 
Monday. Oil prices, meanwhile, are higher following fighting between Israel and 
Iran, but they have come off their peaks from overnight.

   The S&P 500 rose 0.7% following its 2.6% drop from Friday, which was its 
worst since October. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 207 points, or 
0.4%, as of 9:35 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 1.1% higher.

   Some of the best performers were companies that sell computer chips, memory 
and other products fueling the AI boom. They had plunged Friday amid worries 
that their prices had simply shot too high due to AI euphoria. Such worries 
dragged South Korea's Kospi index down 8.3% at the start of Monday, pummeling 
tech stocks there like Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix.

   But prices recovered as trading moved westward through Europe to New York. 
Micron Technology rose 8.3% after sliding 13.3% Friday for the largest loss in 
the S&P 500. That resumed a run where its stock has more than tripled so far in 
2026.

   Marvell Technology climbed 8.8% in its first trading after S&P Dow Jones 
Indices said the semiconductor company's stock has grown enough to join its 
widely followed S&P 500 index. Marvell's stock has also more than tripled so 
far this year, aided by a 32.5% surge in one day last week. That was its best 
day since it began trading in 2000, and it came after Nvidia's CEO, Jensen 
Huang, suggested at a conference in Taiwan that Marvell could be "the next 
trillion-dollar company."

   That such a comment could add billions of dollars to a company's value in an 
instant suggests to critics that AI stocks are running too hot. Chip and memory 
companies are indeed reaping big growth because of the AI boom, but their stock 
prices have been soaring at astounding speeds. A widely followed index of 
semiconductor stocks surged nearly 85% for the year so far through Thursday, 
for example.

   Now, the question is whether Friday's drop is the start of a wider downturn 
or just a pause that shakes out excessive optimism.

   Michael Wilson, a strategist at Morgan Stanley, is relatively optimistic. 
"Markets rarely move in a straight line at the pace seen since the March lows," 
he wrote in a report. "In our view, a correction was inevitable and ultimately 
healthy if this bull market is going to extend into year-end" and pull the S&P 
500 to his baseline target of 8,000. That would be an 8.3% rise from Friday's 
close.

   In the oil market, prices climbed after Israel and Iran launched strikes 
against each other, threatening to drag the region back into full-scale war. 
The price for a barrel of Brent crude oil, the international standard, briefly 
topped $98 overnight, but it later eased back to $94.25, up 1.2%, after the 
Iranian military said that it was halting offensive operations.

   High oil prices caused by the war with Iran have already sent inflation 
higher, which increases not only bills for households but also yields in the 
bond market. High yields worldwide recently have threatened to slow economies 
and undercut prices for stocks and all kinds of other investments.

   On Monday, Treasury yields eased a bit to take some pressure off the stock 
market. The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 4.51% from 4.55% late Friday 
and gave back some of Friday's jump.

   In stock markets abroad, indexes dipped in Europe following more severe 
losses in Asia.

   Japan's Nikkei 225 dropped 3.8% after the Japanese government revised the 
country's annualized economic growth rate to 1.8% for the first quarter this 
year, down from an earlier estimate of 2.1%.

   Stocks also fell 1.7% in Shanghai and 1.2% in Hong Kong.

   ___

   AP Business Writers Yuri Kageyama and Matt Ott contributed to this report.

   ---------

   itemid:a4b9336d67a15d19d9aa5394e5a30be6