Stock futures ticked up Friday as traders tried to shake off a bruising three-day stretch for tech stocks and a dramatic crypto sell-off. The short-term rebound — Dow futures rose about 124 points while S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 contracts were up roughly 0.4%–0.6% — felt more like a pause than a new trend: headlines and balance-sheet moves kept investors nervous.
Big tech: recovery, but not without pain
Some of the week’s hardest-hit names staged a modest bounce. Nvidia and Microsoft, which had taken double-digit hits earlier in the week, climbed back as bargain hunters stepped in. The broader software group, though, remained under pressure: the iShares Expanded Tech-Software ETF (IGV) slid another ~5% Thursday and has lost more than 11% for the week — its worst stretch in years — as investors debate how AI will reshape software margins and spending.
That debate was amplified by Amazon’s quarterly update. The e-commerce giant narrowly missed EPS expectations and surprised markets by signaling it expects roughly $200 billion in capital spending for 2026. Investors reacted harshly: Amazon shares plunged — reports put the drop in the high single digits into double digits in after-hours trade — as traders parsed the mix of aggressive investment and softer near-term profit guidance.
Amazon’s spending plan is the kind of long-horizon bet that splits the market: some see required investment to keep cloud and logistics dominance; others see a near-term drag on returns. Either way, the size of the outlay helped tilt the tape toward caution.
Winners, losers and corporate resets
Not every name suffered. Reddit surprised the market with a better-than-expected fourth quarter, upbeat guidance and a $1 billion buyback, sending the stock higher in premarket trade. Roblox also rallied on a strong forecast for bookings, highlighting that pockets of digital-ad and platform strength still exist despite broader tech worries.
Contrast that with the auto sector’s shocker: Stellantis said it will take a roughly €22.2 billion ($26 billion) charge as it scales back parts of its EV program. The disclosure wiped billions off the company’s market cap as investors digested the cost of resetting strategy and compensating suppliers.
Crypto whiplash and commodities chaos
Bitcoin’s volatility underscored the week’s risk-off mood. The token plunged as much as ~16% overnight — briefly dipping below $61,000 — before clawing back into the mid-$60,000s. The swing has been brutal for retail and fund managers who’d piled into crypto-linked ETFs and margin-heavy positions; some names with concentrated exposure reported steep losses.
Silver, too, felt the strain. Thin liquidity and speculative positioning sent the metal into gutting intraday swings, reversing recent parabolic gains as large holders and traders rushed to exit.
Why traders are jittery
There are a few threads connecting the market moves: aggressive capital spending by Big Tech, renewed questions over AI’s winners and losers, and a sudden evaporation of liquidity in speculative corners like crypto and silver.
AI is a particularly thorny factor. On one hand, companies are investing heavily — sometimes visibly — to race ahead. On the other, analysts are wrestling with which business models will actually benefit and how fast. Those tensions play out across gold-plated balance sheets and smaller software firms alike. (For a sense of how major tech firms are pushing ahead with new AI tooling, see Microsoft’s recent in-house image model and Apple’s plans to integrate a custom Gemini model into Siri.)
Investors are also watching macro signals: the January jobs report was delayed until next week after a brief federal disruption, and other data points this week showed softer labor demand and rising layoff announcements — nudges that make bulls think twice about overextending.
The mood going into the close
Friday’s futures gain offered a little breathing room, not a clean reset. Risk assets rallied modestly but the market’s backdrop of heavy corporate spending, earnings misses and episodic liquidity crunches means volatility could remain elevated. Traders will be watching earnings and fresh economic reports for cues — but for now, the tape feels like a market still sorting winners from losers in an AI-shaped world.
Related reading: Microsoft’s new text-to-image push shows why firms are racing into AI Microsoft Unveils MAI-Image-1, and Apple’s move to use a custom Gemini model reflects the broader pivot to embed large AI models across products Apple to Use a Custom Google Gemini Model to Power Next‑Gen Siri.