US Pre-Market: Futures Rebound After a CPI-and-Iran Rout, Oracle Sinks on AI Capex

Sentiment: mixed S&P 500 futures: +0.72% | Nasdaq-100 futures: +1.19%

S&P 500 futures point 0.72% higher and Nasdaq-100 futures 1.19% higher on Thursday, a day after the cash S&P 500 fell 1.62% to 7,266.99 on a hot 4.2% May CPI print and a fresh round of the US-Iran war. Oracle (ORCL.US) is down 10.41% pre-market after record fiscal fourth-quarter results were overshadowed by capital spending of $55.7 billion. Crude is easing, with WTI off 0.91% to $89.21, after overnight US strikes hit Iranian air defenses rather than oil infrastructure and the Strait of Hormuz stayed open.

What drove the overnight session

• May CPI 4.2%: headline consumer prices rose 0.5% in May for a 4.2% annual rate, the highest since April 2023, with energy up 3.9% on the month and accounting for more than 60% of the all-items gain. Core CPI was softer at 0.2% on the month and 2.9% annually, below the 0.3% consensus, so the surge is an energy story tied to the war rather than inflation broadening into core prices.
• US-Iran war: US Central Command said its latest airstrikes ended just before sunrise Thursday, targeting Iranian surveillance, communications, and air-defense sites near Tehran and Bandar Abbas. Brent is up more than 25% since the conflict began but is down 1.12% this morning to $92.06, with the Strait of Hormuz still passing cargoes.
• AI-chip split: NVIDIA (NVDA.US) fell 3.73% on Wednesday in a broad AI-hardware selloff, yet semiconductors are rebounding pre-market. The divide is between the chipmakers and the hyperscalers funding the buildout, and Oracle sits on the spender side of it.
• Rates and the dollar: the US 10-year yield sits at 4.542%, up about 1.4 basis points, and the dollar index is at 100.09, up 0.14%, as markets price the Federal Reserve holding rates on June 17.

Where US stocks closed Wednesday

• S&P 500: 7,266.99 (-1.62%)
• Nasdaq Composite: 25,169.50 (-1.98%)
• Dow Jones: 49,918.78 (-1.87%, a fall of 953 points)
• Russell 2000: 2,835.46 (-1.10%)
• VIX: 22.22 at Wednesday's close, indicated near 20.71 pre-market

Wednesday's decline ran deepest in technology, as the hot headline CPI erased what remained of near-term rate-cut expectations and the Iran escalation lifted oil. The Dow's 953-point drop was its steepest of the week.

Overnight in Asia and Europe

• Nikkei 225: 64,217.27 (+0.06%)
• Hang Seng: 24,249.29 (-0.65%)
• Shanghai Composite: 3,987.01 (-0.16%)
• KOSPI: 7,763.95 (+0.43%)
• FTSE 100: 10,355.49 (+0.98%)
• STOXX 600: 623.68 (+0.89%)
• DAX: 24,253.33 (+0.24%)
• CAC 40: 8,240.41 (+0.96%)

Asia was little changed, with Korea up 0.43% and Japan flat, while Hong Kong fell 0.65%. European equities are firmer in mid-session, and the energy-heavy FTSE 100 leads at +0.98% with Brent holding above $92.

Pre-market movers

• ORCL.US is down 10.41% to $182.29. Fiscal fourth-quarter revenue hit a record $19.2 billion (+21%) and total cloud revenue rose 47% to $9.9 billion, with cloud infrastructure up 93%, but capital expenditure of $55.7 billion to build out AI data centers drew the selling.
• INTC.US is up 4.01% to $111.33, extending a rebound tied to reports that Alphabet and NVIDIA are lining up Intel as a backup AI-chip foundry, including a plan for Alphabet to build three million in-house chips there in 2028, plus a Bank of America upgrade.
• AMAT.US (+3.36%) and LRCX.US (+2.55%) are higher with the chip-equipment group as money moves back into semiconductors after last week's selloff. NVDA.US is up 0.93% pre-market.

US economic calendar today (ET)

• 8:30am: May Producer Price Index, consensus +0.7% on the month versus +1.4% prior, with core PPI +0.5% versus +1.0% prior and the core annual rate near 5.4%.
• 8:30am: weekly initial jobless claims, consensus 220,000 versus 225,000 prior, and continuing claims near 1,780,000.
• The Federal Open Market Committee decision lands June 17, and after CPI the market reads it as a hold.

What to watch

• Whether the 8:30am PPI confirms the CPI signal that pipeline inflation is concentrated in energy rather than broadening into core goods and services.
• Crude direction around the Strait of Hormuz, since energy is the single largest contributor to the current inflation surge.
• Whether the semiconductor rebound holds into the cash open or fades the way Wednesday's early bounce did.

Context only. Not financial advice. Track your own trades with Swingfolio.