New York, February 9, 2026, 13:46 (EST) — Regular session
- Nvidia climbed roughly 3% following word that Apollo is close to finalizing a loan deal involving Nvidia AI chips leased to Elon Musk’s xAI.
- Shares of Oracle surged over 11% following an upgrade to “buy” from D.A. Davidson, which pointed to the OpenAI cloud partner’s prospects.
- Eyes are on U.S. jobs numbers due Feb. 11, with CPI set for Feb. 13—both key for the next rate signals.
Nvidia stock climbed roughly 3.1% to $191.08 on Monday. The move followed a report that Apollo Global Management is nearing a $3.4 billion loan deal for an entity aiming to purchase Nvidia chips, then lease them out to Elon Musk’s xAI. 1
AI stocks worked to steady themselves in the aftermath of last week’s tech rout. This year, Big Tech is on track to pour roughly $650 billion into artificial intelligence—an “eye-popping number,” as Anna Rathbun, founder and CEO of Grenadilla Advisory, put it. 2
Timing is everything for traders right now. Two key checkpoints loom: U.S. economic data set to land this week, and, before the month’s out, Nvidia’s results. That’s the one investors keep circling — they see it as a litmus for whether AI-fueled spending is still driving real demand and letting Nvidia hold its line on pricing.
Apollo stepping in with financing marks another instance of Wall Street’s balance sheets getting drawn into the AI race, beyond just corporate spending. According to The Information, Valor Equity Partners is organizing the deal, which could come together as soon as this week. Nvidia hasn’t responded to a request for comment. Apollo wouldn’t comment either.
The report pointed to a trend that’s picking up steam in AI: companies are leasing high-cost compute gear instead of making big upfront purchases. Apollo has done this before with xAI, backing a comparable arrangement—a $3.5 billion loan last November, according to Reuters.
Advanced Micro Devices climbed roughly 3.4% to finish at $215.48, while Broadcom tacked on about 4.4%, closing at $347.46. Other AI chip stocks were up too.
Oracle shares jumped roughly 11.2% to $158.83, easily outpacing the market after D.A. Davidson bumped its rating to “buy” from “neutral” and held firm on its $180 target. The firm cited hopes that a “revamped OpenAI” can deliver on its commitments to Oracle and others this year, Investopedia reported. 3
Microsoft jumped roughly 2.8% to $412.41. That move helped anchor the megacap AI names in positive territory, despite investors still scrutinizing the costs tied to the boom.
Even so, corners of the market linked to the “AI disruption” theme are still on edge. Reuters points out that software and services stocks have trailed the S&P 500 by almost 24 percentage points in the last three months, following a selloff sparked in part by Anthropic’s Claude model introducing a new legal tool—one that’s reignited debate over the future of traditional software business models. 4
But the split can hurt on the downside, too. If customers start tightening budgets, or rising financing costs begin to squeeze, chipmakers and cloud vendors can feel the pain just as quickly as the software crowd. Options markets are already pricing in sizable moves for software stocks, and that volatility often spills over into wider AI trades when new macro data nudges rate outlooks.
Coming up, investors are watching the delayed January nonfarm payrolls, expected Feb. 11, followed by the January CPI landing on Feb. 13. After the data hits, focus shifts to corporate results—Nvidia’s earnings are in the spotlight later this month, plus all eyes on whether the Apollo-xAI financing wraps up as early as this week.
