Breakfast | Trump announces the imposition of reciprocal tariffs! Tesla and NVIDIA support the Nasdaq in leading the gains

Market Overview

Inflation data, geopolitical issues, and tariff policies have eased market concerns, leading to a broad rise in U.S. stocks on Thursday, with technology stocks supporting the Nasdaq's lead. The three major indices continued to rise and closed near their daily highs.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.77% to 44,711.43 points, the S&P 500 index rose 1.04% to 6,115.07 points, and the Nasdaq rose 1.5% to 19,945.64 points. NVIDIA rose over 3%, and Cisco rose more than 2%, leading the Dow. Tesla rose over 5%, and Apple rose nearly 2%. Most Chinese concept stocks rose, with Zhihu up over 10% and Gaotu Group up more than 6%.

The strong performer AppLovin surged 24%; Coinbase's total revenue for the fourth quarter exceeded expectations, rising about 4% in after-hours trading.

Trump Announces Equal Tariffs

On February 13 local time, U.S. President Donald Trump announced that he has decided to impose "equal tariffs," meaning that the tariff rates imposed by the U.S. and its trading partners will be equal. He stated that he would consider imposing tariffs on countries that use a value-added tax system. Trump indicated that the practice of shipping goods through other countries to avoid tariffs would not be accepted.

However, he did not specify when the tariffs would be imposed. Media reports suggest that the equal tariffs will not take effect on Thursday and may come into effect on April 1.

Reports Indicate Apple Continues Collaboration with Baidu to Develop AI Features for Chinese iPhone Users

Baidu's U.S. stock rose about 4.5% pre-market and closed up 3.5%. The Information reported that Baidu is currently developing two significant AI features: an AI-driven search function capable of processing images and text, and an upgrade to the Chinese version of the Siri voice assistant. These features are part of Apple's Apple Intelligence suite.

Apple Announces Product Launch Event on February 19, May Introduce New iPhone SE

The new version will be similar to the iPhone 14, featuring a larger screen and Face ID. This will mark the end of the iconic Home button interface introduced by co-founder Steve Jobs for the first-generation iPhone in 2007.

Musk's Strong Purchase of OpenAI: A Major Negative for Tesla?

Reports indicate that Musk plans to form a consortium to acquire OpenAI, raising concerns among Tesla investors that Musk's attention may be diverted to other platforms. In early April 2022, after Musk first disclosed his stake in Twitter, Tesla's market value plummeted by more than two-thirds.

Musk Sets Conditions for Withdrawing $97.4 Billion "Ridiculous" Acquisition Proposal: OpenAI Remains Non-Profit

Musk and other investors had jointly proposed to acquire OpenAI's non-profit division for $97.4 billion. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has publicly rejected Musk's proposal, stating that Musk's actions are a means to "slow down the development pace of competitors." Court documents on Wednesday revealed that Musk would withdraw the acquisition proposal if ChatGPT developer OpenAI ceases its transition to a for-profit entity.

Masayoshi Son's Arm Developing Its Own Chips, Targeting Meta as First Customers, Stock Price Soars

According to the Financial Times, Arm plans to launch its first self-developed chip this year, expected to debut as early as summer. The new chip will serve as the CPU platform for large data center servers, based on customizable designs, with production potentially outsourced to specialized manufacturers like TSMC. This move by Arm marks a transformation in its business model and could reshape the power balance in the $700 billion semiconductor industry.

Following this news, Arm's stock price surged by 5%, and the increase expanded to over 6% by the close. Since the beginning of 2025, its stock has risen more than 33%, reflecting investors' high recognition of the company's core position in the AI systems field.

Bridgewater reduced holdings in tech giants like NVIDIA, Alphabet A, Apple, and Meta in the fourth quarter, built positions in Tesla, and increased stakes in AppLovin and data center power stock Vistra

The 13F report shows that Bridgewater built a long position in Tesla in the fourth quarter, holding 150,000 shares, and established positions in ServiceNOW, Brookfield, Moderna, and PPL.

They increased their holdings in the S&P 500 ETF-SPDR by nearly 7.4 million shares, an increase of 883%, and also increased stakes in AppLovin, AT&T, Vistra, AMD, PayPal, eBay, influencer brokerage Robinhood, and Qualcomm.

They completely sold their positions in Micron Technology, Vanguard S&P 500 ETF, Goldman Sachs, Electronic Arts, and Spotify.

They sold 1.25 million shares of NVIDIA, 750,000 shares of Alphabet A, and reduced holdings in Meta, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Procter & Gamble, Johnson & Johnson, Walmart, Coca-Cola, and Applied Materials, with the largest reduction in Apple, reaching 40% or 410,000 shares.

Major assets include SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust, iShares Core S&P 500 ETF, iShares Core MSCI Emerging Markets ETF, Alphabet A, and NVIDIA.

Report: GameStop considers investing in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies

CNBC cited sources saying that GameStop (GME) is considering investing in Bitcoin and other types of cryptocurrencies. GME's stock rose by 18.75% in after-hours trading.

The People's Bank of China releases the 2024 Q4 China Monetary Policy Implementation Report

The report states that in the next phase, a moderately loose monetary policy will be implemented effectively. A comprehensive use of various monetary policy tools will be employed to maintain ample liquidity, ensuring that the growth of social financing and money supply aligns with economic growth and the expected target for overall price levels. Promoting a reasonable rebound in prices will be an important consideration in guiding monetary policy, aiming to keep prices at a reasonable level. The transmission mechanism of monetary policy will be smoothed out to better grasp the relationship between stock and increment, focusing on revitalizing existing financial resources and improving the efficiency of fund utilization.

U.S. January PPI year-on-year increase is the highest in nearly two years, but the PCE inflation-related components show moderate performance

Following yesterday's CPI data exceeding expectations, the U.S. January PPI also remained strong, significantly reducing expectations for the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates. However, due to the weak performance of the PPI components—financial and healthcare services—that make up the Fed's preferred Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) price index in January, the "New Federal Reserve News Agency" expects the core PCE increase to be much lower than that of the CPI The market reacted dovishly to this PPI report.

Goldman Sachs Executive: This is my last bullish email on U.S. stocks this quarter

Scott Rubner, a strategist at Goldman Sachs Group and Managing Director of Global Markets, stated that the U.S. stock market is about to face a wave of bearish attacks, as the current U.S. stock market is becoming increasingly crowded, and the motivation to buy on dips is weakening, approaching negative seasonal factors. Rubner suggested paying attention to some tactical bearish trading strategies