US Markets
Stocks Fall Pre-Bell Amid AI Safety Warnings; Investors Await Fed Rate Decision
The benchmark US stock measures were tracking in the red before the opening bell Monday as traders assess warnings from leading artificial intelligence executives about the rapid pace of AI developments and await a major policy decision by the Federal Reserve later in the week.The S&P 500 declined 0.8%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average decreased 0.3%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq fell 1.8% in premarket activity. All three main indexes finished Friday trading higher, snapping a four-day losing streak.Dario Amodei, chief executive of AI chatbot Claude maker Anthropic, called on the industry Saturday to slow the pace at which it advances AI model capabilities. His three-step plan for ensuring that safety measures keep pace with advances in AI model capabilities includes placing independent evaluators inside leading AI companies with "employee-like access."OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Tesla (TSLA) and SpaceX (SPCX) CEO Elon Musk supported Amodei's call in posts on X.Shares of Nvidia (NVDA), Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), Micron Technology (MU), SanDisk (SNDK), Intel (INTC) and Qualcomm (QCOM) were down pre-bell. Shares of AI hyperscalers including Microsoft (MSFT), Alphabet (GOOG, GOOGL), Amazon (AMZN) and Meta Platforms (META) also dropped.With no major economic reports scheduled for Monday, traders will focus on the Fed's monetary policy committee meeting scheduled for Tuesday, with a decision on interest rates due the following day. Markets are currently pricing in an 87% probability that the central bank will hike its benchmark lending rate by 25 basis points, with the remaining odds in favor of another Fed pause.In remarks emailed toon Friday, Oxford Economics said it "expects a third consecutive set of moderate inflation readings to tip a narrow majority towards holding rates," although "rising oil prices and still-elevated inflation make a risk-management case for a hike."Last week, official data showed that US consumer inflation hit a three-month high in August as energy prices rose, while the core measure unexpectedly accelerated.Treasury yields were down, with the two-year rate retreating 1.8 basis points to 4.63% while the 10-year rate was off 1.6 basis points to 4.96%.West Texas Intermediate crude oil rose 2.6% to $102.66 a barrel, while Brent gained 2.7% to $107.38.A diplomatic meeting between Iran and several Gulf states to discuss the future of the Strait of Hormuz has been called off, following Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthis' attack on a military airbase in Saudi Arabia, Reuters reported. The meeting was scheduled for Monday.Saudi Arabia's Energy Ministry said Friday that the kingdom shut down its key East-West crude oil pipeline in the Riyadh and Madinah regions as a precautionary measure a day after the facility was targeted in multiple attacks. The pipeline closure leaves the Strait of Hormuz as the kingdom's only route for moving large volumes of crude westward, according to Rystad Energy.Gold slipped 1.9% to $4,327 per troy ounce, while bitcoin edged 0.9% higher to $77,992.
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