Nasdaq Hits Record High as AI Stocks Surge; AMD Tops $1 Trillion

NEW YORK — U.S. stocks rallied sharply as oil prices and Treasury yields fell and artificial intelligence-related shares surged.

The Nasdaq Composite closed at 27,122.09 on the 21st, up 599.55 points, or 2.26%, from the previous session, setting a record high. The Standard & Poor's 500 rose 114.20 points, or 1.49%, to 7,764.70, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 366.19 points, or 0.71%, to 52,048.83.

Most large-cap technology stocks advanced. Nvidia rose 2.30%, Apple gained 0.85%, Microsoft added 1.61%, Amazon climbed 1.87%, Google parent Alphabet rose 1.55%, TSMC gained 2.41%, Facebook parent Meta jumped 11.43%, Broadcom added 1.60%, Tesla rose 3.03% and Micron gained 2.77%. SK hynix slipped 0.73%. SpaceX fell 0.56% even as the broader market rose.

AMD, a rival to Nvidia, saw its market capitalization top $1 trillion (about 1,400 trillion won) for the first time. The stock surged 9.95% on the day, lifted by a boom in AI infrastructure spending, pushing its market value to $1.0048 trillion. It is the fourth U.S. chipmaker to cross the $1 trillion threshold, after Nvidia, Broadcom and Micron. Amid broad strength in semiconductor shares, the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index soared 4.29%. Meta rose more than 11% on strong reception for its AI agent "Muse."

Equities got a lift as oil prices fell on expectations that U.S. President Donald Trump could hold talks with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian at the United Nations General Assembly in New York. On the ICE Futures Exchange in London, Brent crude for November delivery settled at $100.34 a barrel, down 3.4% from the previous session. That was the lowest close since the 8th, when it settled at $97.92, and the largest one-day decline since the 25th of last month. On the New York Mercantile Exchange, U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude for October delivery fell 4.5% to $95.78 a barrel.

Asked on the 20th about the possibility of meeting Pezeshkian at the General Assembly, Trump said it would probably be open. Trump is scheduled to address the assembly on the 22nd and Pezeshkian on the 23rd. In a separate interview with Fox News, Trump also warned that the question was when the entire country would be blown up.

The drop in oil prices pushed the yield on the 10-year U.S. Treasury note, the bond market's benchmark, as low as 4.943% during the session. The two-year yield, which is more sensitive to monetary policy, rose as high as 4.772%, moving in the opposite direction.