Dow futures build on the best day since April 2025 while Nasdaq futures slip as Qualcomm sinks about 9% before the bell

The morning after Wall Street's biggest rally in more than a year and a half, stock futures are pulling in two directions. Contracts tied to the Dow Jones Industrial Average extended Wednesday's surge, while futures on the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 slipped as a sell-off in Qualcomm and fresh worries about data center rules weighed on chipmakers.

The split in futures

Dow futures were up about 0.4% to 0.5% early Thursday, according to Yahoo Finance, FXStreet and Benzinga. S&P 500 futures were close to flat, between unchanged and 0.1% lower, while Nasdaq 100 futures fell about 0.6% to 0.7%. At their weakest overnight, Nasdaq 100 futures had been down about 1% to 1.3%, according to Stocktwits and CoinCentral. Readings move quickly before the open, so the exact figure depends on the time.

FXStreet described the move as a rotation: investors are shifting money away from technology stocks, which face the risk of tighter data center regulation under a Democratic Congress, and into other parts of the market. Benzinga's premarket check showed the same pattern in exchange-traded funds, with the Dow-tracking DIA up about 0.5% and the Nasdaq 100-tracking QQQ down about 0.6%.

Wednesday's rally in numbers

The split follows a powerful session. The Dow jumped 1,569.40 points, or 3.03%, to 53,356.12 on Wednesday, its best day since April 9, 2025, and its first close above 53,000 since Sept. 8, according to CNBC and Sharecast. The S&P 500 gained 1.58% to 7,688.62 and the Nasdaq Composite rose 1.44% to 25,736.51, the Associated Press and CNBC reported.

Stocks rallied after Democrats won both chambers of Congress and President Donald Trump accepted the results, which CNBC said removed a layer of political uncertainty. Gains extended in the afternoon as U.S. crude fell more than 8% after Vice President JD Vance blamed the Iran war for Republican losses, according to CNBC.

Qualcomm leads the chip decline

Qualcomm is the biggest single drag on tech futures. Its shares fell about 9% to 10% in premarket trading, according to Reuters, Investing.com and Public.com, after the company reported results late Wednesday. Adjusted revenue of $10.44 billion and adjusted earnings of $2.17 a share edged past estimates, Investing.com and Tradingpedia reported, but revenue from handset chips, Qualcomm's largest business, fell 26% to $5.14 billion. The outlook for earnings and margins also came in below expectations.

Chief executive Cristiano Amon told Reuters the company had prepared for the memory shortage. "Unlike some other companies, we saw the memory shortage coming and prepared for it early," he said. The premarket drop would wipe out Qualcomm's 5.3% gain from Wednesday's session.

Yields, the dollar, oil and gold

Treasuries kept rallying. The 10-year yield was about 4.87% early Thursday, according to CNBC and Benzinga, down from roughly 4.89% at Wednesday's close. The 2-year yield was little changed near 4.58%. The ICE dollar index was around 101.5 after falling on Wednesday, according to ATFX and Equiti.

Oil steadied after one of its steepest drops of the year. U.S. crude settled near $88 a barrel on Wednesday and Brent near $94.60, both down more than 8% to their lowest levels since late August, according to Stocktwits, ATFX and FXBus, as investors bet that a change of power in Washington could speed up an end to the war with Iran. Brent was up about 1% on Thursday morning, RTTNews and Stocktwits reported. Axios reported on Wednesday that the U.S. military is preparing for a possible return to major combat operations, while Qatar is trying to win both sides' backing for a draft agreement, according to Benzinga.

Gold extended its rally. Spot gold rose about 1.6% to around $4,125 an ounce, a two-week high, after gaining about 3.3% to 3.4% on Wednesday, its biggest one-day jump since August, according to RTTNews and FXBus.

What matters today

The economic calendar starts at 8:30 a.m. ET with weekly jobless claims and the preliminary third-quarter productivity and unit labor cost figures, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics and Macro Bullseye. Forecasts for initial claims sit around 195,000 to 196,000, after 194,000 the prior week. Challenger's October job cuts report is also due this morning, and the Bank of England announces its rate decision at about 7 a.m. ET.

Wednesday's data were mixed. ADP said private employers added 86,000 jobs in October, above the 75,000 estimate, while the ISM services index slipped to 54.5 from 54.9 and its prices-paid gauge stayed high at 73.0, according to ISM, The Boston Report and Trade2Spike. Markets priced roughly a 79% to 83% chance of a quarter-point Fed rate hike in December, according to CME FedWatch figures cited by Benzinga and FXBus. The October jobs report is due Friday.

Earnings remain a driver. ConocoPhillips, Kimberly-Clark and Toyota report before the open, and Airbnb after the close, according to FXStreet, Benzinga and eOption. For investors, the early read is that the election rally has moved beyond the AI trade: the question for the open is whether money keeps rotating into the rest of the market as chipmakers wobble.