The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 0.5% on Wednesday to a new all-time high, even as the Nasdaq Composite and the S&P 500 lost ground. The split finish came after a strong rally, and it showed that investors were still choosing winners rather than backing the market as a whole.
Trump said a deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz could happen as early as Wednesday, giving traders a fresh reason to buy into the Dow even as the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite slipped 0.8% to end a 4-day rally. The S&P 500 also retreated from a record and closed down nearly 0.2%, underscoring how quickly the mood turned from broad optimism to a narrower chase for safety and energy-linked exposure.
That move mattered because the Strait of Hormuz is a critical waterway for a fifth of the world's oil, and any change in access can ripple through markets fast. Brent crude traded above $79 per barrel, while WTI crude oil futures hovered near $75 per barrel, keeping the oil market at the center of the day’s trading even as investors also watched earnings from Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk, Western Digital, Sandisk, Walt Disney, Shopify, and Uber Technologies.
The market reaction was not clean or uniform. Shares of Nvidia soared more than 3%, but AMD shares fell despite an earnings beat and a strong outlook, and SpaceX shares dropped 13% after AI spending overshadowed a second quarter earnings beat. SpaceX stock also faces extra pressure this week, when 20% of shares will be unlocked for trading, a reminder that even in a record-setting market, company-specific worries can still overwhelm the broader theme.
On Tuesday, Qatar said a proposal had been drafted between the US and Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, and Iran is reportedly considering allowing European countries to remove mines from the strait. That leaves the biggest question unresolved: whether the deal that lifted the Dow can actually be put in place, and whether it would include the kind of terms that make shipping through the waterway normal again.
