S&P 500 adds 1.2% for the week as tech heavyweights offset an Iran-driven Dow drop
S&P 500 week close: 7,575 (+1.23%) Nasdaq Friday close: 26,282 (+0.29%) Sentiment: mixed
US stocks finished the first week after the July 4 holiday higher at the index level but narrow underneath. The S&P 500 rose 1.23% for the week and the Nasdaq gained 1.74%, both carried by a small group of large technology and AI names. The Dow fell 0.50% and the small-cap Russell 2000 slipped 0.61%, so the average stock did little while the cap-weighted indices climbed. A mid-week collapse of the US-Iran ceasefire pushed oil and Treasury yields higher and lifted bets on a Federal Reserve rate hike, yet it was not enough to pull the S&P or Nasdaq into the red.
The week on Wall Street
The S&P 500 closed the week at 7,575, roughly 1% below its early-June record and up about 10% for the year. The path there was uneven. After a quiet post-holiday start, technology and AI names ran hard mid-week: Meta rose 14.8% over the five days, Broadcom added 11.0%, Arista Networks gained 16.9% and the China-internet group joined in, with Alibaba up 16.8%. That rally lifted the Nasdaq and the S&P even as breadth stayed thin.
The macro tone turned mid-week. President Trump declared the US-Iran ceasefire over at the NATO summit in Ankara, and the Dow shed 577 points in a single session as oil climbed and rate-hike odds for year-end jumped toward 85% under hawkish Fed Chair Kevin Warsh. Crude posted a weekly gain of more than 4%, snapping a four-week losing streak, with Brent near $76 a barrel. The US 10-year yield rose to 4.57%, up about 8 basis points on the week. Despite the geopolitical jolt, the VIX fell 6.9% to 15.03, a sign the losses stayed concentrated in cyclicals, small caps and momentum trades rather than the broad index.
Sector scorecard (5-day)
- Best: Energy, which led the week as oil rose more than 4% on the Iran flare-up.
- Also strong: Technology, semiconductors and networking, with Meta +14.8%, Broadcom +11.0%, Arista +16.9%, Seagate +11.0% and Akamai +11.5%.
- Worst: Basic materials, dragged lower alongside a heavy slide in aerospace, defense and space names.
- Dispersion was wide, from Crinetics +97.9% on a takeover to Ionis -28.8% on a failed trial.
Communication services and China internet were the standout pockets of strength, while the high-flying defense and space names, up sharply earlier in the year, unwound across the board.
Top movers, week ending July 10
| Ticker | Week | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| CRNX.US | +97.9% | Vertex agreed to buy Crinetics for $85 a share, near $10 billion, for acromegaly drug Palsonify. |
| PENG.US | +27.5% | AI-memory and infrastructure demand lifted the small-cap on MemoryAI and AI-factory traction. |
| KC.US | +19.9% | Morgan Stanley started Kingsoft Cloud at Overweight as China AI-cloud names rallied. |
| UGP.US | +18.3% | Brazilian fuel and LPG distributor Ultrapar rode the week's energy-sector leadership as oil climbed. |
| HPE.US | +17.7% | AI-server and Juniper-networking demand carried the stock with the broad AI-infrastructure bid. |
| IONS.US | -28.8% | Eplontersen missed the primary endpoint in the CARDIO-TTRansform Phase 3 heart study. |
| AVAV.US | -24.3% | Defense-drone momentum unwound, extending a slide after June's accounting restatement. |
| SOLS.US | -23.6% | Solstice sold off on its own $14.5 billion purchase of Element Solutions. |
| RKLB.US | -19.3% | Space names pulled back after a 25%-plus prior-week run, with no confirmed catalyst. |
| NTLA.US | -19.1% | Gene-editing name gave back part of a roughly 38% monthly run on HAE trial data. |
Friday US session
- S&P 500: 7,575 (+0.42%)
- Nasdaq: 26,282 (+0.29%)
- Dow: 52,637 (+0.29%)
- VIX: 15.03
Friday was a mild stabilization after Thursday's Iran-driven drop. All three major indexes edged higher and the VIX eased back toward 15, closing the week on a steadier footing. Energy stayed firm into the weekend with crude holding its weekly gain, while the defense and space names that led the week's decline saw no rebound. The steadier Friday did little to change the week's story: a handful of large technology and AI stocks led the advance, and the rest of the market lagged.
Macro themes that played out
Three threads defined the week. First, the AI-infrastructure trade broadened beyond the usual leaders into networking, memory and hardware, with Arista, Seagate, HPE and Penguin Solutions all posting double-digit weekly gains. Second, geopolitics returned as a market driver: the collapse of the US-Iran ceasefire mid-week lifted oil more than 4% and pushed year-end rate-hike odds toward 85%, a hawkish repricing that hit the Dow and small caps harder than the tech-heavy indices. Third, healthcare delivered its usual binary outcomes, with Vertex's near $10 billion takeover of Crinetics sending that stock up 98% while Ionis fell 29% after eplontersen failed its main heart-disease endpoint.
Week ahead, Mon to Fri (ET)
- Mon Jul 13: No tier-one US data. Markets set up for a week loaded with inflation data and the start of Q2 bank earnings.
- Tue Jul 14: June CPI at 8:30am ET, with headline inflation seen near flat and core around +0.3%. Q2 bank earnings open before the bell: JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, Wells Fargo and Bank of America. Chicago Fed's Austan Goolsbee speaks.
- Wed Jul 15: June PPI. Morgan Stanley, BlackRock, Johnson & Johnson and ASML report. New York Fed's John Williams speaks.
- Thu Jul 16: June retail sales and weekly jobless claims. Netflix and TSMC report.
- Fri Jul 17: University of Michigan consumer sentiment, preliminary July reading.
Fed Chair Kevin Warsh also makes his first congressional testimony of his term during the week, before the House Financial Services Committee. With CPI, bank earnings and the Iran headlines landing together, the week ahead will test whether the narrow, tech-led advance can hold.
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