NextFin News - U.S. stocks fell sharply Tuesday as fresh American airstrikes on Iranian targets sent oil prices higher and compounded a global bond selloff that pushed the 10-year Treasury yield to its highest level since January 2025. The session's central tension pitted renewed Middle East escalation and mounting rate-hike expectations against a market that had just closed out a fifth consecutive winning month for the Dow. Energy was the lone bright spot among major sectors, while chip and AI-infrastructure names extended recent weakness, and after the closing bell, both Palo Alto Networks and Dell Technologies reported blowout quarters that tested just how much good news the market is still willing to reward.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.79% The S&P 500 Index fell 0.71% The Nasdaq Composite declined 1.03%
Stock & Sector Performance
Energy was the standout sector, rising 1.3% on the day as oil prices jumped on the renewed Iran conflict, while consumer discretionary lagged badly, down 1.9%. Housing-related names were a particular weak spot after data showed construction spending fell 0.5% in July to its lowest level since October 2023: the iShares U.S. Home Construction ETF lost almost 2%, Builders FirstSource slid 4%, LGI Homes fell 3%, and Home Depot tumbled 2%. AI-infrastructure plays also slid as investors turned risk-off ahead of tonight's earnings, with the iShares A.I. Innovation and Tech Active ETF down more than 1%, Lumentum dropping more than 5%, Teradyne falling 5%, and Coherent shedding 2%. Dell fell nearly 6% intraday heading into its report. Moderna was a notable gainer, up 5%. Nike touched a fresh 52-week low near $38.07, its lowest level in more than two decades, while travel and entertainment names including Wynn Resorts, Las Vegas Sands, VICI Properties, and Carnival also hit 52-week lows; healthcare and energy names bucked the trend, with Pfizer and Marathon Petroleum both touching 52-week highs.
Magnificent Seven trading was led by a standout divergence: Apple posted its best single-day performance in more than a month, rising notably as John Ternus officially became CEO, succeeding Tim Cook, with Ternus's first internal memo to employees reportedly touting a "phenomenal" upcoming iPhone launch. Elsewhere in the group, the tone was decidedly weaker — Nvidia declined roughly 2% and Alphabet fell about 2.2%, both weighing on the broader tech-driven selloff. Reliable closing figures for Microsoft, Amazon, Meta, and Tesla were not available in today's reporting at publication time.
After the Bell: Dell and Palo Alto Networks Report
Dell Technologies delivered one of the most explosive quarters in its history. The company reported record fiscal second-quarter revenue of $47.0 billion, up 58% year-over-year, alongside record diluted EPS of $6.34, up 273%, and record non-GAAP diluted EPS of $7.04, up 203% — both figures far ahead of the roughly $45.1 billion revenue and $4.91 EPS Wall Street had modeled heading into the print. The results were powered by Dell's AI server business, where the company booked a record $60.9 billion in orders, recognized a record $16.4 billion in AI server revenue for the quarter, and exited the period with a record $95 billion backlog — nearly double the $51.3 billion backlog reported just one quarter earlier. Vice Chairman and COO Jeff Clarke said the strength reflects a broader shift in how customers view IT spending, noting that "IT environments have shifted from cost centers to value drivers that fuel growth and competitive advantage, and customers are investing accordingly." The quarter also tested a key concern heading into the report: rising server DRAM prices, which TrendForce had projected would climb 13% to 18% sequentially in the current quarter, pressuring the thin margins on Dell's GPU-dense AI server systems. With the stock already down nearly 6% intraday ahead of the release, the scale of tonight's beat leaves the after-hours reaction as the next signal of whether investors believe Dell can convert its swelling backlog into durable profit even as memory costs climb.
Palo Alto Networks also reported fiscal fourth-quarter results that beat Wall Street on every headline metric, yet the stock continued its recent slide, falling about 2% in extended trading on top of a 5% drop during the regular session. The cybersecurity company posted revenue of $3.41 billion, up 34% year-over-year and ahead of the $3.35 billion consensus, with adjusted earnings per share of $1.02 versus a $0.98 estimate. Next-Generation Security annual recurring revenue surged 63% to $9.10 billion, and remaining performance obligations grew 34% to $21.2 billion. The company posted a GAAP net loss of $282 million, or $0.35 per share, reversing a year-earlier profit, largely reflecting acquisition-related and stock-based compensation charges. For fiscal 2027, Palo Alto guided to revenue of $14.10 billion to $14.20 billion, representing 23% to 24% growth, alongside non-GAAP EPS of $4.16 to $4.19 — both ahead of prior Street estimates — and announced the acquisition of Console, an AI-native agentic workflow platform, to expand its Cortex security offering. Despite the clean beat-and-raise, the muted reaction extends a pattern flagged by market strategists heading into the print: shares had fallen after four of the company's last five earnings reports, as investors continue to demand near-perfect execution from a stock that has roughly doubled over the past year.
Explore more exclusive insights at nextfin.ai.
