Global markets were turbulent this week on speculation about US President-elect Donald Trump’s trade policies.
Initial gains on Monday (January 6), driven by rumors of less aggressive tariffs, were followed by a mixed performance as the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) kicked off in Las Vegas, Nevada, and investors awaited key economic data.
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Unsurprisingly, CES underscored the growing influence of artificial intelligence (AI) across the tech landscape, with AI chips for PCs, new electric vehicles and the imminent influence of robotics on the workforce taking center stage.
NVIDIA, whose CEO Jensen Huang gave the keynote address at CES, was a key focus.
After a product reveal, NVIDIA saw its share price fall 8.5 percent to US$140.01 on Tuesday (January 7), its largest intraday drop since October 15. Chief among the AI bellwether’s long list of new products are the new GeForce RTX 50 series GPUs, built on the Blackwell architecture. The flagship RTX 5090 for demanding workloads will be available this month for US$1,999, while the RTX 5070, a more budget-friendly version, will arrive in February for US$549.
While AI PCs generated excitement at CES, another trend emerged: the rise of generative physical AI.
During his keynote, Huang emphasized how the forthcoming shift will revolutionize factory and warehouse automation, a rising subsector he described as “a multi-trillion dollar opportunity.”
However, as conflicting US jobs and inflation data rolled in, traders’ hopes of an interest rate cut by March diminished. Yields for 10 year treasuries touched 4.73 percent, resulting in a broad selloff affecting cryptocurrencies and other risk-on assets like tech stocks. The top cryptocurrencies dropped between 4 and 9 percent in early trading on Tuesday.
US Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) saw near-record outflows of US$582 million on Wednesday (January 8), as the downward trajectory continued. Ether ETFs also saw substantial outflows totaling US$159.3 million on Wednesday, their largest on record since July. By Thursday (January 9), US$655 million in Bitcoin futures contracts had been liquidated.
Altcoins saw greater losses, with XRP being the sole exception.
Securities Disclosure: I, Meagen Seatter, hold no direct investment interest in any company mentioned in this article.
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