Short attack on storage stocks; has already established a short position against SanDisk.

Last night and this morning, the U.S. stock market experienced a quiet day of gains. As the AI star company Anthropic, which has recently triggered multiple sell-offs in global software stocks, conveyed a “collaborate rather than replace” message during its latest briefing, the software industry overall is rebounding.

At the close, the S&P 500 rose 0.77%, to 6,890.07; the Nasdaq Composite increased 1.04%, to 22,863.68; the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 0.76%, to 49,174.5.

(Nasdaq daily chart, Source: TradingView)

As one of the few developments on Tuesday, investor concerns about the software sector have eased somewhat. During Anthropic’s briefing, the company announced collaborations with a series of traditional software companies to jointly launch workplace AI agents.

Driven by this, Thomson Reuters closed up 11.41%, SaaS leader Salesforce rose 4.07%, and FactSet increased 5.9%.

Wedbush Securities stated in a research report released on Tuesday that Anthropic’s activity indicates that the competitive risk posed by AI to the software industry has been exaggerated.

They believe that AI models currently do not have the capability to replace entire workflows, which remain “deeply embedded” in existing software infrastructure. The analysts wrote: “The reality is that these new AI tools will not completely disrupt and replace the existing software ecosystem and data environment. The scope of AI tools ultimately remains limited by the data they can access.”

Of course, Tuesday was just a waiting period before major news lands. At 10 a.m. U.S. Eastern Time today, Trump will deliver the annual State of the Union address to Congress. The capital markets will closely watch the U.S. president’s statements on Iran and tariffs. After tomorrow’s close, “world’s most valuable chipmaker” Nvidia will release its earnings report.

Popular Stocks Performance

By market cap, Nvidia, which will report earnings tomorrow, rose 0.68%; Apple increased 2.24%; Google-A fell 0.19%; Microsoft gained 1.18%; Amazon rose 1.6%; TSMC increased 4.25%; Meta rose 0.32%; Broadcom fell 1.47%; Tesla gained 2.39%; Berkshire Hathaway-A rose 0.14%; Walmart increased 0.75%; AMD surged over 8%.

Most Chinese concept stocks strengthened, with the Nasdaq Golden Dragon China Index up 1.37%.

At the close, Alibaba rose 0.22%; Pinduoduo increased 1.06%; NetEase gained 0.73%; JD.com rose 1.07%; Baidu fell 0.23%; Ctrip increased 1.59%; Li Auto rose 1.3%; Futu Holdings fell 1.89%; Bilibili declined 0.5%; NIO increased 0.19%; China Internet Plus Service Sector surged 6.68%; GDS rose 6.72%; 51Talk gained 7.75%.

Other News

Short-seller Citron Research Attacks SanDisk

On Tuesday, short-seller Citron Research announced that it has established a short position in storage stock SanDisk. This caused SanDisk’s stock price to plunge intraday; although it briefly rebounded, it ultimately closed down 4.2%.

Citron believes the market is mispricing NAND storage companies as long-term core AI assets, which they see as a clear mismatch. They argue that NAND remains a highly supply-dependent commodity industry, which has historically peaked during high-margin cycles. Meanwhile, as industry leader Samsung restores capacity and yield rates and ramps up high-end SSDs, the current “shortage” could quickly disappear.

Meta and AMD Announce Massive “Chip + Equity” Subscription Deal

On Tuesday, Meta and AMD announced that Meta will deploy up to 6 gigawatts of AMD computing chips, equivalent to a multi-year order valued at $60 billion. Additionally, under certain milestone conditions, Meta can buy up to 160 million shares of AMD at $0.01 each, representing 10% of the company. At the close, AMD rose 8.77%.

Payment Processor Stripe Rumored to Consider Acquiring PayPal

PayPal surged late Tuesday, ending up 6.73%. According to reports, payment processor Stripe is interested in acquiring all or part of PayPal’s assets. Earlier Tuesday, Stripe announced its valuation reached $159 billion in an employee offering.

Touchscreen MacBook Pro Expected to Launch This Fall

Renowned Apple leaker Mark Gurman revealed that Apple’s first touchscreen MacBook Pro will debut this fall. These new models will feature a touch-optimized system interface and a “Dynamic Island” similar to the iPhone, but slightly smaller in size.

Paramount Raises Bid for Warner Bros. Discovery

Warner Bros. Discovery announced on Tuesday that Paramount has increased its bid to $31 per share, claiming the offer is “reasonably expected” to beat Netflix’s bid. If Warner Bros. Discovery’s board ultimately deems the new bid superior, Netflix will have four days to raise its previous offer or walk away with the $2.8 billion breakup fee funded by Paramount.

(Source: Cailian Press)