By Alex Financials

🧠 Market Sentiment This Week: Tech Troubles Amid AI Concerns

U.S. stock markets are kicking off the week on a cautious note. After a holiday-shortened Presidents’ Day weekend, stock futures — especially for major indexes like the Nasdaq and S&P 500 — pointed lower as investors grapple with lingering worries about AI-driven disruption and valuation risk.

• Multiple major tech names have extended recent losses in pre-market and futures trading, signaling continued pressure on the sector.

• Bloomberg reports that investor caution stems from concerns about whether heavy spending on AI infrastructure will drive long-term profits.

This tech sell-off is dragging broader indexes down as the market seeks fresher catalysts — and potentially a clearer view of economic direction from upcoming data.

📉 Major Indexes: Markets Slipped Lower on Tuesday

According to Associated Press, the major U.S. stock indexes were down on Tuesday as markets returned from the long weekend:

• S&P 500: declined ~0.8%

• Dow Jones Industrial Average: down ~0.4% (-183 points)

• Nasdaq Composite: slid ~1.2%

Weakness in several high-profile stocks — particularly in technology and software — helped drive these moves. Broader risk-off sentiment also contributed to the slide.

📊 Stocks in Focus: Winners and Losers

Here’s how individual companies are shaping the narrative:

🔻 Tech and Growth Stocks Under Pressure

• $AAPL (Apple Inc.), $GOOGL (Alphabet Inc.), $AMZN (Amazon.com Inc.), $META (Meta Platforms Inc.), and $NVDA (Nvidia Corp.) remain under selling pressure as investors reassess AI valuations.

📈 Select Movers & Corporate News

• Warner Bros. Discovery shares and Paramount Skydance rallied on merger interest, with Paramount’s bid extension stirring excitement.

• Masimo Corp. jumped sharply in pre-market trading after acquisition news, while Genuine Parts Co. and Vulcan Materials Co. fell.

• Medtronic, despite posting earnings, traded lower amid conservative outlooks.

Those shifts highlight how corporate developments and M&A activity are influencing stocks outside the tech space even as the broader market cools.

🤖 AI & Tech Valuations: Central Theme Driving Volatility

Market commentary today underlines a broader theme:

Investors’ confidence in the “AI trade” is fading, especially around companies heavily tied to artificial intelligence build-outs and software licensing models. Some analysts describe a sort of “reset” in big tech valuations as markets reassess future earnings potential versus current capital-expenditure commitments.

This rotation has also brought interest back to more traditional sectors like energy, utilities, and consumer staples, which showed relative strength amid the tech sell-off this session.

🌍 Global Market Context

• Asian markets were down as many exchanges remained partially closed for the Lunar New Year holiday, including significant weakness in Japan’s Nikkei index.

• In India, major equity indices — the Nifty 50 and BSE Sensex — closed higher, reflecting continued buying interest across banking and IT sectors.

This mixed global backdrop suggests that while U.S. equities struggle for direction, other regions are showing diverging patterns.

📌 What to Watch This Week

Investors will be closely watching several key developments:

• Upcoming Federal Reserve minutes and inflation data, which could influence expectations on interest rate policy.

• Second-half earnings from large caps — especially results from major tech players like $NVDA, which could set the tone for tech sector confidence.

📈 Quick Recap

Key themes impacting markets today:

• 🧨 AI-related valuation concerns suppressing tech stocks.

• 💼 Dow and S&P working cautiously as macro data focus continues.

• 📊 M&A and company-specific moves shaking certain pockets of market activity.

• 🌍 Global divergences between U.S. weakness and regional gains.