CNBC Daily Open: Record highs for Microsoft and Nvidia
All the turmoil at OpenAI over the weekend turned out pretty well — for Sam Altman and Microsoft , at least. Altman's got a role at Microsoft heading its new artificial intelligence lab. The appointment sent Microsoft shares to a new high.
Wedbush Securities tech analyst Dan Ives, in a note published Monday, had strong words regarding the drama over the weekend. The OpenAI board "was at the kids poker table and thought they won until Nadella and Microsoft took this all over in a World Series of Poker move for the ages with the Valley and Wall Street watching with white knuckles Sunday night/Monday early am," Ives wrote .
"We view Microsoft now even in a STRONGER position from an AI perspective with Altman and Brockman at MSFT running AI," he added.
To be sure, these are early days in the OpenAI-Sam Altman saga. The situation is still volatile, but for now, it seems the scales are firmly tipped to one side.
Meanwhile, at another corner of the technology industry, anticipation over Nvidia's earnings report later today pushed the chipmaker's shares up to a record high. If history repeats itself , then Nvidia might smash even its out-of-this-world forecast. But with so much good news already baked into the company's share price, it's hard to see the stock rising more substantially in the near-term.
Regardless, markets had a positive start to the week. The S&P 500 climbed 0.74%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.58% and the Nasdaq Composite rose 1.13%. Both the S&P and the Nasdaq enjoyed their fifth consecutive day of gains.
Investors will also be keeping an eye on minutes of the Federal Reserve's most recent meeting due later today. Given the Fed's preference of telegraphing its intentions so starkly, the likelihood of anything unexpected in the minutes is slim. That's a good thing — we've had enough excitement across the past few days.
— CNBC's Sophie Kiderlin contributed to this report.
