The US technology sector is behind a significant surge in US stock markets overnight, with the Nasdaq gaining over 3% as news regarding the Omicron variant continues to improve.
After Dr Fauci highlighted the lower severity of the disease, GlaxoSmithKline (LON: GSK) declared their treatment was seeing positive results in various mutations of the disease.
The S&P 500 and Dow Jones also delivered strong gains, up 2.1% and 1.4%, respectively, with the likes of NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) and Adobe (NASDAQ: ADBE) among the leaders, gaining 8% and 4%.
In fact, all but eight of the Nasdaq 100 stocks finished higher.
Intel to demerge
Shares in Intel (NASDAQ: INTC) gained 3% after the company announced it was considering the demerger and separate listing of its own self-driving car unit, called Mobileye.
The company was purchased for US$15 billion in 2018 for its chip-based camera guidance systems and may be worth as much as US$50 billion.
Meanwhile, the US trade deficit fell 18% amid the largest surge in exports in over 13 years, with experts blaming port closures for the massive fall in imports.
US stock market movers
Here’s how other popular US stocks performed on Tuesday.
- Novavax (NASDAQ: NVAX) up 28.9%
- MongoDB (NASDAQ: MDB) up 16.4%
- Datadog (NASDAQ: DDOG) up 9.7%
- Atlassian (NASDAQ: TEAM) up 8.4%
- DocuSign (NASDAQ: DOCU) down 3.7%
- Comcast (NASDAQ: CMCSA) down 5.3%
This strong lead from US stock markets is set to drive the S&P/ASX 200 (ASX: XJO) higher at the open this morning. For a round-up of the latest news, check out my ASX 200 morning report.