US Open: indices opens lower at the start of the week 🔔

The weak sentiment from last week continues into the new one. U.S. indices open lower after already experiencing significant declines in Friday's session. At the moment, investor appetite for risky assets remains weak, with the dollar slightly strengthening. The biggest losses are seen in technology and small-cap stocks, specifically in the US100 and US2000 indices.

Declines are visible across nearly all sectors. The only exceptions are Nvidia and Alphabet, which are posting slight gains at the beginning of the session.

US100

The technology index continues its decline after Friday’s sharp sell-off. The drop is directly linked to deteriorating sentiment following the release of economic data on Friday. However, this was more of a catalyst rather than the sole reason for the negative sentiment, as several factors contribute to it.

High company valuations leave little room for further growth, especially given rising geopolitical risks and trade war concerns. The nearest support level for US100 could be around 21,200 points, while in case of a rebound, the first resistance level might be just below 22,000 points.

Source: xStation 5

Stock market news

Equinox Gold (EQX.US) shares dips 3% despite announcing a court-approved acquisition of Calibre Mining (CXBMF), creating a diversified gold producer with a C$7.7B market cap. The merger will establish Equinox as Canada’s second-largest gold producer, with expected 2025 output of 950,000 ounces, excluding additional production from Valentine and Los Filos.

Domino’s Pizza (DPZ.US) dropped 6% after missing Q4 earnings expectations due to weak U.S. traffic, which grew just 2.3%, half of the prior year’s rate. Despite international sales growth and a 15% dividend increase to $1.74 per share, total U.S. same-store sales edged up only 0.4%, below analyst expectations of 1.5%.

Hawaiian Electric (HE) declined over 1.70% after weak Q4 results, with revenue down 6% year-over-year and EPS missing estimates by $0.20. The company continues to suspend dividends to common shareholders, citing reduced cash needs following a recent equity issuance.

Alibaba (BABA) dropped 9.70% despite announcing a $52.44B investment in cloud computing and AI over three years, exceeding its past decade’s total spending. CEO Eddie Wu emphasized cloud computing as Alibaba’s leading AI revenue driver, with the company launching its Qwen2.5-VL model, claiming superiority over OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google in AI evaluations.