Stock Market Today: Wall Street Rises as Fed Cut Looms, Nvidia Gets China Nod

U.S. stocks edge higher on December 9, 2025, as traders await a widely expected Fed rate cut, digest Nvidia’s conditional China chip approval and a bidding war for Warner Bros.

Key points

Wall Street inched higher on Tuesday, December 9, 2025, as the Federal Reserve began a two‑day meeting that is widely expected to deliver a quarter‑point rate cut, the third this year. ^[1]
Nvidia and AI chips dominated the story after President Donald Trump approved exports of the H200 AI processor to “approved customers” in China in exchange for a 25% revenue share for the U.S. government, even as Beijing prepares to limit access to the chips. ^[2]
Global markets were cautious: government bond yields eased after a sharp run‑up, central banks from Canberra to Ottawa stayed in focus, and a bidding war for Warner Bros. added drama to an already busy week for investors. ^[3]

Fed meeting sets the tone for Wall Street

Wall Street’s mild rebound comes at the start of one of the most important policy weeks of 2025. The Federal Reserve kicked off its final two‑day meeting of the year on Tuesday, with investors almost certain it will cut the federal funds rate by 25 basis points on Wednesday, to a target range around 3.50%–3.75%. ^[4]

Futures markets tracked by CME’s FedWatch tool put the odds of a quarter‑point cut close to 90%, and many traders see roughly another half‑percentage point of easing coming in 2026. ^[5]

Yet while the move itself is largely priced in, the tone of the decision is what’s keeping investors on edge. Analysts widely expect what’s been dubbed a “hawkish cut”: a reduction in rates paired with messaging that the bar for further cuts is rising, reflecting still‑elevated inflation and an economy that has slowed but not stalled. ^[6]

Recent economic data have only muddied the picture. The Labor Department’s October Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) showed vacancies ticking up to roughly 7.7 million, above forecasts, but hiring remained subdued—fuel for both the “inflation still too high” and “labor market is cooling” camps inside the Fed. ^[7]

As one Wall Street economist put it, policymakers are “as much in the dark as the rest of us,” underscoring how fine the balance is between cutting too quickly and not cutting enough. ^[8]

Major indexes edge higher, still near records

After a weaker session on Monday, when the Dow fell about 0.5% (roughly 250 points) and both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq slipped, stocks regained modest ground on Tuesday. ^[9]

By early afternoon in New York on December 9:

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up around 0.1%–0.3%.
The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite gained about 0.2% each, leaving the S&P 500 within roughly half a percentage point of its all‑time closing high. ^[10]

Under the hood, sector performance reflected a cautiously optimistic risk tone:

Energy stocks led the advance, climbing around 1.5%–1.6%, helped by slightly firmer crude prices after a steep slide the previous session. ^[11]
Financials also outperformed, rising close to 1% as investors bet that a gentle downward path for rates could support lending margins without triggering a deep slowdown. ^[12]
Small‑cap stocks, represented by the Russell 2000, extended their recent outperformance, adding close to 0.7% on the day after a strong quarter relative to the mega‑cap dominated S&P 500. ^[13]

Monday’s pullback had followed a stretch when all three major indexes sat “within striking distance” of record highs. Tuesday’s bounce, though modest, kept that narrative intact: the rally of the past six weeks remains primarily driven by expectations of Fed easing and cooling inflation, with AI‑linked tech still carrying outsized weight in the indexes. ^[14]

Nvidia’s conditional China reprieve reshapes the AI trade

The day’s most closely watched corporate story was Nvidia, the world’s most valuable company by market capitalization, now around $4.5 trillion. ^[15]

On Monday, President Trump said the U.S. would allow Nvidia to export its H200 artificial‑intelligence accelerator — the firm’s second‑most powerful AI chip line — to “approved customers” in China and other markets. In exchange, 25% of revenue from those sales would flow to the U.S. government. ^[16]

Key details of the deal include:

The H200 had previously been barred from China on national‑security grounds; the new approval comes on top of an earlier, smaller revenue‑sharing deal for Nvidia’s less advanced H20 chip. ^[17]
The same framework is expected to apply to other U.S. chipmakers, including AMD and Intel, potentially opening a new pathway for exporting advanced AI hardware while maintaining U.S. control and revenue participation. ^[18]

Initially, Nvidia’s stock jumped as much as 2% in premarket trading on the news. But gains faded after a report from the Financial Times, cited by Reuters, indicated that Beijing plans to limit access to the H200 chips, likely allowing only selective usage by Chinese firms. Nvidia shares were last little changed to slightly higher on the day—up around 0.6% after giving back much of the early pop—while the broader chip sector was mixed. ^[19]

For Nvidia, the announcement underscores just how central China remains to growth, even as both Washington and Beijing try to shape the terms of engagement. Analysts at Swissquote and other firms warn that the practical impact might be limited if Chinese regulators lean on local companies to steer clear of the chips or if the approval does not extend to newer lines like Blackwell or Rubin. ^[20]

Outside the U.S., the decision added pressure to Chinese technology shares, with Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Tech Index falling nearly 2% as investors weighed the possibility of tighter domestic curbs on U.S. AI hardware. ^[21]

Warner Bros in the spotlight as the streaming battle heats up

Away from semiconductors, media and entertainment stocks provided some of the day’s biggest corporate headlines.

Shares of Warner Bros. Discovery continued to react to an increasingly messy takeover fight. The studio and streaming group surged about 11% over the previous two sessions after Paramount Skydance launched a reported $108 billion hostile bid, days after Warner had agreed to an $83 billion offer from Netflix. ^[22]

On Tuesday:

Warner Bros. shares added roughly another 1.4%–1.5%.
Paramount Skydance slipped a couple of percent after its initial spike. ^[23]

The drama has spilled into politics as well. Trump has publicly questioned the Netflix‑Warner tie‑up, suggesting it “could be a problem,” raising uncertainty over how regulators — and the White House — might view either deal. ^[24]

For investors, the saga crystallizes several themes at once: consolidation pressure in streaming, the premium value of deep content libraries, and the unpredictability of political intervention in high‑profile M&A.

Stock‑specific movers: AutoZone, Home Depot, CVS and more

A handful of individual names were notable drivers beneath the index level:

AutoZone was among the S&P 500’s worst performers, sliding close to 7% after the auto‑parts retailer posted weaker‑than‑expected quarterly profit and sales. Margin pressure tied to inventory accounting and higher operating expenses disappointed investors who had viewed the stock as a defensive play. ^[25]
Home Depot shares slipped around 1%–3% across Monday and Tuesday trading after the company issued a softer‑than‑expected outlook for fiscal 2026, citing sluggish home‑improvement demand and a slow housing recovery. ^[26]
CVS Health moved higher, gaining roughly 2.5% after raising full‑year guidance, a sign that cost‑cutting and its strategic shift deeper into healthcare services are beginning to pay off. ^[27]
Alphabet (Google) traded modestly higher even as the European Commission opened a fresh antitrust investigation into whether Google unfairly used web publishers’ content to train AI models and advantaged its own products in search and news. The probe is the latest sign of intensifying regulatory scrutiny on how tech giants build and deploy generative AI tools. ^[28]

Together, these moves highlight a market that’s still rewarding solid execution and credible growth stories, even as macro uncertainty around rates and global trade persists.

Global markets: bond rout pauses, central banks crowd the calendar

The U.S. market action unfolded against a cautious global backdrop.

In global government bond markets, a sharp selloff earlier in the week finally eased. The 10‑year German Bund yield slipped a couple of basis points to around 2.85%, still near a nine‑month high, while the U.S. 10‑year Treasury yield edged down toward 4.16%. ^[29]

The pullback followed a hawkish shift in rhetoric from European Central Bank board member Isabel Schnabel, who suggested the next move in euro‑zone rates is more likely to be up than down if inflation proves sticky. That commentary had pushed both European and U.S. yields sharply higher on Monday. ^[30]

Other global highlights:

The Reserve Bank of Australia left rates unchanged but signaled it was not ruling out further hikes, sending the Australian dollar near a 2½‑month high before it pared gains. ^[31]
The Bank of Canada and Swiss National Bank are both scheduled to decide policy later this week and are widely expected to hold rates steady. ^[32]
The U.S. dollar index firmed slightly as traders braced for a “hawkish cut” from the Fed and priced in fewer total cuts over the next year than they had earlier this autumn. ^[33]
The Japanese yen weakened after a powerful earthquake in Japan raised questions about whether the Bank of Japan might delay a long‑anticipated rate hike at its December 18–19 meeting. ^[34]

In equities, European benchmarks such as the STOXX 600 were marginally softer, while Asian markets were mixed, with notable declines in Hong Kong’s tech‑heavy indices. ^[35]

What’s next for investors

With the Fed’s decision due Wednesday, December 10, the next 24–48 hours are likely to determine whether this year’s powerful equity rally can continue into 2026 or pauses for breath.

Here’s what market participants will be watching most closely:

The Fed’s dot plot and projections
Beyond the widely expected 25‑basis‑point cut, investors will scrutinize how many additional cuts officials pencil in for 2026 — and how unified the committee appears. Several analysts expect multiple dissents from both hawkish and dovish members, a rarity that would underline the level of internal debate. ^[36]
Powell’s press conference
The language Fed Chair Jerome Powell uses around inflation risks, the labor market and financial conditions could either validate or challenge the market’s current optimism. Since late October, U.S. equities have tended to rally on any signal of easier policy ahead and sell off on hawkish surprises. ^[37]
Ongoing AI and chip headlines
Investors will keep parsing the fine print of Nvidia’s export permissions, Beijing’s response, and whether similar deals emerge for AMD, Intel and other chipmakers. Any sign that more advanced lines like Blackwell could be cleared — or, conversely, that China will aggressively discourage purchases — could swing both individual stocks and the broader AI trade. ^[38]
Corporate updates from tech and infrastructure plays
Earnings and outlooks from data‑center and cloud‑linked names such as Oracle and Broadcom, due later this week, will offer another read on whether real‑world AI spending is living up to the lofty expectations embedded in many stock prices. ^[39]

For now, December 9, 2025, finds Wall Street in a classic holding pattern: indexes are near records, volatility is subdued, and the market’s most important catalyst — the Fed’s final word on 2025 — is just hours away.