Welcome to Markets Desk, here's what's moving.
Equities are in the green across the board today as easing tensions in the Middle East give investors reason to step back into risk. The S&P five hundred is up nearly two thirds of a percent, the Dow adding over one percent, and the Nasdaq holding modest gains as the geopolitical premium bleeds out of the market and sentiment firms up heading into the afternoon session.
Feeding that broader optimism is a fresh read on the AI buildout, with second quarter data showing insatiable demand for memory chips and infrastructure hardware driving what could be another above-average contribution to economic growth. The boom is no longer a forecast — it is showing up in the numbers, and Wall Street is pricing that reality in.
Meanwhile, CME Group has launched cash-settled single-stock futures on fifty-five U.S. equities, including names like SpaceX and Micron, with micro-sized contracts on twenty-two of those names. Trading runs twenty-three hours a day, giving retail and institutional players alike a new instrument for around-the-clock exposure to some of the market's most closely watched companies.
That's the tape. Markets Desk, signing off the floor.
