Dow, S&P 500 Reach Record Highs... Micron Soars 10% [New York Stock Market Briefing]

The three major U.S. stock indices closed higher. At CES, the world's largest information technology (IT) and consumer electronics trade show, technology companies unveiled advanced artificial intelligence (AI) roadmaps, boosting expectations for technological innovation and lifting the market; the Dow and the S&P 500 each hit record highs.

On the 6th (local time) at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at 49,462.08, up 484.90 points (0.99%) from the previous session. The S&P 500 rose 42.77 points (0.62%) to 6,944.82, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite gained 151.35 points (0.65%) to close at 23,547.17. Both the S&P 500 and the Dow set new record highs that day.

At the opening of 'CES 2026', major tech companies each presented advanced AI roadmaps. Jensen Huang, CEO of NVIDIA, focused his keynote on expanding the AI platform ecosystem. He introduced an autonomous driving AI program called 'Alphamayo.' It was a vision that NVIDIA would capture market dominance not only at the chatbot level but also in the physical world of 'physical AI.'

Huang said, "AI has fundamentally changed everything about computing," adding, "It is no longer about programming software but training it, and that involves graphics processing units (GPUs) rather than central processing units (CPUs)."

AMD CEO Lisa Su also said in her keynote that global AI computing demand has grown 100-fold over the past three years and will need to grow another 100-fold over the next five years, and that AMD has developed various products to meet the surging AI demand across data centers, personal computers, and industrial facilities.

As AI and robotics began to converge at this CES, related stocks in New York continued to show strength.

The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index also rose 2.75% that day, marking a third consecutive day of gains. Micron Technology surged 10%, pushing its market capitalization to $386.4 billion, surpassing AMD.

Lam Research (6.26%), Applied Materials (4.11%), Qualcomm (3.48%), and Texas Instruments (8.43%) also showed strength. By contrast, NVIDIA fell 0.47% and AMD fell 3.04%.

Ross Mayfield, an investment strategist at Baird, said, "Although tech stocks were somewhat subdued at year-end, no one would dispute that AI is a technology that will change the landscape," adding, "At the same time, as long as AI and tech stocks perform well, other cyclical elements of the market can also function well."

With stronger buying in cyclical stocks, the Dow outperformed the tech-heavy Nasdaq for a third consecutive day. Amazon rose 3.38%, and buying sentiment was strong across various industries including Walmart, Visa, Home Depot, Caterpillar, and Salesforce.

By sector, energy plunged 2.81% while healthcare, industrials, and materials each rose around 2%.

Chevron, which had been expected to benefit from news that Venezuelan oil infrastructure was opening to the U.S., fell 4.46%, giving back the previous day's gains, as hopes faded amid analyses that it would take years and hundreds of millions of dollars to restore Venezuelan oil infrastructure to normal operation.

Tesla also fell 4.14%. Concerns were reflected that NVIDIA's launch of the Alphamayo autonomous-driving AI software could erode Tesla's profits.

According to the CME FedWatch Tool, federal funds futures priced in an 81.7% probability that rates will be held steady this month. Late in trading the previous day, that probability was 83.4%.

The CBOE Volatility Index (VIX) fell 0.15 points (1.01%) from the previous session to 14.75.

Jeong-sam Ko, Hankyung.com reporter jsk@hankyung.com