The ball drops during the 2025 New Year’s Eve celebration in Times Square on December 31, 2024 in New York City.
Stewart New York | Movie Magic | Getty Images
This report comes from today’s CNBC Daily Open, our international markets newsletter. CNBC Daily Open keeps investors updated on everything they need to know, no matter where they are. Like what you see? You can subscribe here.
What you need to know today
Market year end celebration
U.S. stocks closed lower on the last trading day of 2024, but Higher year-end results. Asia-Pacific markets fell on Tuesday, with many exchanges having shortened trading days. China’s CSI 300 index ended the year up 15%, ending three consecutive years of declines, but fell 1.6% on the day.
Will Bitcoin hit $200,000 in 2024?
Bitcoin In December 2024, after Donald Trump, who was largely seen as crypto-friendly, won the US election, Bitcoin surpassed the $100,000 mark. Industry executives and cryptocurrency investors see strong momentum in Bitcoin, with some predicting it will soar to $200,000 this year.
Nippon Steel grants U.S. veto power
fate Nippon Steel’s planned acquisition United States Steel Corporation US President Joe Biden will make a decision by January 7. Reuters quoted people familiar with the matter as saying that in order to persuade Biden, Nippon Steel proposed to give the U.S. government veto power on U.S. Steel’s production capacity cuts.
Alibaba AI model price reduction
Alibaba The company announced on Tuesday that it would cut the price of its visual language model by up to 85%. The model, called Qwen-VL, is designed to understand text and images. Alibaba’s move signals increasing competition among China’s tech giants as they aim to gain market share for their artificial intelligence products.
(PRO) Top and Bottom-Rated Stocks for 2024
Seven baskets of stocks boosted S&P 500 Index Looking ahead to most of 2024. Surprisingly, the three worst-performing stocks include technology market leaders.
bottom line
A brilliant start, a sagging middle, then a lackluster thump – that’s the trajectory of the game S&P 500 Index last year.
The broad-based index has been on a tear since the start of 2024. That’s more than 10 times the average gain since 2000, CNBC’s Robert Hum noted.
This momentum cannot be sustained. In the second and third quarters of 2024, the S&P rose 3.9% and 5.5% respectively. But the index’s performance in the first quarter was set so high that performance in subsequent quarters pales in comparison.
In the final quarter of 2024, the S&P rose just 1.9%. To make matters worse, someone mischievously prevented Santa from having his typical year-end rally at the stock market.
Of course, if something is gained, something is gained. But when looking back at the highs at the start of 2024, or comparing it to the average fourth-quarter growth rate of 4.2% since 2000, it’s hard not to feel disappointed.
Still, a relatively weak year-end performance won’t be enough to hinder the S&P 500’s gains in 2024.
Much of the gains in 2024 will be driven by artificial intelligence stocks. shares NVIDIA Soared 171%, while BroadcomOne portfolio manager called it “the next great Nvidia,” and the stock jumped 108%.
But there is still uncertainty in the market this year. Investors will have to contend with policies from the incoming Trump administration, including potentially higher-than-expected interest rates this year, which in turn will lead to higher U.S. Treasury yields, among other headwinds.
The start of 2025 could be bumpy. Fasten the straps.
—CNBC’s Robert Hum, Jesse Pound, Gina Francolla and Samantha Subin contributed to this report.
About The Author
