BISHOP'S STORTFORD, ENGLAND - JANUARY 25: Snowfall in the Essex countryside on January 25, 2021 in Bishop's Stortford, Essex, United Kingdom.

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Stocks finish flat on sleepy trading day

The S&P 500 broke its five-day winning streak but closed higher for the week.

12/26/25 4:04PM

Stocks were little changed amid thin trading volumes. While the S&P 500 notched a new intraday high, the benchmark index broke its five-day win streak. The Nasdaq 100 also closed marginally lower, while the Russell 2000 underperformed relative to the other indexes.

Movers:

Nvidia rose on Wednesday’s news of its licensing agreement with AI inference specialist Groq.
Coupang surged after the online retailer said customer information downloaded in a data breach has been deleted.

Luke Kawa12h

Nvidia’s strong results, guidance lift AI ecosystem

Data center stocks Applied Digital, IREN, CoreWeave, and Nebius as well as foundry giant TSMC and optical communications company Corning are catching a bid in after-hours trading thanks to strong results and guidance from Nvidia.

The chip designer’s massive outlook for Q1 sales — with the midpoint at $78 billion, versus a consensus estimate of $72.8 billion — underscores the magnitude of the near-term demand for AI compute and chips. As if the hyperscalers’ massive capex budgets hadn’t already done that!

To be sure, the advances in these stocks in after-hours trading are fairly mild, since most had been on fire in recent sessions in anticipation of a strong quarter.

Nvidia rises after better than expected Q4 results, big upside surprise in Q1 sales guidance

To be sure, the advances in these stocks in after-hours trading are fairly mild, since most had been on fire in recent sessions in anticipation of a strong quarter.

Luke Kawa

12h

Nvidia rises after better-than-expected Q4 results, big upside surprise in Q1 sales guidance

The chip designer delivered its 13th consecutive bottom-line beat and 14th on the top line.

Max Knoblauch13h

Joby posts smaller loss, larger cash pile than expected in Q4, says it expects US early operations to begin this year

Air taxi maker Joby Aviation reported its fourth-quarter earnings after the bell on Wednesday. Shares climbed more than 3% in after-hours trading.

The company posted a loss of $0.14 per share, beating estimates of a $0.20 loss.

Joby ended the fourth quarter with $1.41 billion in cash (and cash equivalents), compared to Wall Street expectations of $1.01 billion.

Investors have closely watched Joby’s progress with FAA certification, which will be the determining factor for launching commercial air taxi services in the US. As of the end of Q4, Joby said it is 80% complete with the fourth stage of its five-stage certification process, up from 77% in the third quarter. Joby is 12% complete with the fifth stage, up from 10% in Q3.

Earlier on Wednesday, Joby announced it plans to partner with Uber to offer air taxi rides on the ride-hailing app in Dubai later this year. The companies already partner on Blade helicopter rides.

Joby also said it expects US early operations to begin this year, with the White House’s eVTOL (electric vertical takeoff and landing) Integration Pilot Program “set to select at least five sites for mature eVTOL aircraft to begin operating ahead of Type Certification.”

Matt Phillips13h

The Trade Desk plunges on weak Q1 sales guidance

Ad tech platform The Trade Desk offered weak Q1 sales guidance as part of its Q4 earnings numbers, sending the stock down sharply after-hours on Wednesday.

The advertising software company reported:

Adjusted Q4 earnings per share of $0.59 vs. the $0.58 consensus estimate, per FactSet.
Q4 revenue of $847 million vs. the $840.6 million expectation.
Q1 sales guidance of “at least” $678 million vs. Wall Street’s $688.6 million expectation.

The Trade Desk specializes in helping client advertisers shift their ads from traditional linear television toward online streaming services. And the shares posted some impressive gains at times, rising more than 400% over five years starting at the end of 2019.

But the company’s shares have cratered in recent years, in part because of a daunting competitive threat from Amazon’s demand-side advertising platform. Through Wednesday’s close, the stock was down roughly 80% from where it was trading at the end of 2024.

Max Knoblauch13h

Paramount misses on earnings and revenue in its fourth-quarter report

Paramount Skydance reported underwhelming fourth-quarter earnings after the bell on Wednesday, in the midst of its attempt to win the Warner Bros. Discovery bidding war.

For the last three months of 2025, Paramount reported:

An adjusted loss of $0.12 per share, compared to Bloomberg estimates of $0.07 earnings per share.
Revenue of $8.1 billion, missing Wall Street’s expectations of $8.15 billion.

Looking ahead, the company expects Q1 revenue of between $7.15 billion and $7.35 billion, below the $7.39 billion Wall Street consensus estimate.

Earlier this week, Paramount hiked its offer for Warner Bros. to $31 per share. Warner’s board, which has rejected Paramount’s acquisition attempts several times in recent months, said it’s reviewing the new bid.

If WBD determines the Paramount deal to be a superior offer, Netflix will have four days to match it, beat it, or exit the process. Paramount shares have fallen 24% since it made its initial offer for WBD in December.