Chip stocks fall a day after Huang quits Nvidia; 10-year yield holds above 5%

Chip stocks fell on Friday, Nov. 13, a day after Jensen Huang resigned from Nvidia. The Nasdaq Composite lost 0.9% to 25,136.27. The S&P 500 fell 0.4% to 7,561.67, and the Dow rose 50 points, or 0.1%, to 52,347.55.

Nvidia said Thursday that Huang had resigned as president, chief executive and director, effective immediately.

Nvidia’s board opened an independent investigation Nov. 8 after reports that Huang had been the target of a Chinese intelligence effort through an extramarital relationship with Alice Huang, a former executive at Singapore data center company Megaspeed. Huang told employees he had not been faithful to his wife, and China has rejected the spy allegation. The New York Times reported Nov. 11 that Huang had a relationship with a subordinate, and Reuters reported Thursday that he had been involved with a second Nvidia employee.

Chief Financial Officer Colette Kress is interim chief executive and will remain CFO. The board named director Harvey C. Jones its first-ever chair. Reuters reported that the board will consider internal and external candidates for the permanent job.

On Thursday Nvidia closed down 4.3%. The Wall Street Journal reported that the shares had fallen as much as 14% earlier in the day. By the close it had recovered most of that drop.

Advanced Micro Devices rose 5.9%, and Broadcom rose 5.5%. CNBC reported that investors were rotating out of Nvidia and into AMD and Broadcom.

"What you're seeing in markets now is a bit of a rotation into other advanced chip design companies, on the assumption that this will enable other companies effectively to catch up," Mark Franklin, head of multi-asset solutions for Asia at Manulife Investment Management, told CNBC after Thursday's close.

On Friday, AMD fell 8.8% to $534.06, more than erasing Thursday’s gain. Broadcom fell 4.8% to $347.01, giving back most of its gain.

Nvidia fell 2% to $162.85, down 12.7% for the week and 33% below its Oct. 6 intraday high of $243.37. Its market value closed below $4 trillion. HSBC cut its rating on Nvidia to hold Friday and said the shares would lag until the company sets out a permanent succession plan.

Reuters said the resignation could reshape U.S. chip export policy and the AI supply chain, because Huang had pushed to keep access to the Chinese market.

MarketWatch described the slide as Wall Street rethinking the AI trade without Huang.

The Philadelphia semiconductor index fell 3.4%. The VanEck Semiconductor ETF SMH fell 3%. The State Street Technology Select Sector SPDR ETF XLK fell 2%, the worst of the 11 funds that split the S&P 500 into sectors.

The Invesco QQQ Trust, Series 1 QQQ, which tracks the Nasdaq-100, fell 1.2%.

A handful of giant chip stocks can pull the S&P 500 down on their own, because the index gives the largest companies the most weight. The Invesco S&P 500 Equal Weight ETF RSP invests an equal weighting with each company, resetting and equalizing all holdings each quarter. So a few giant companies don't get have an outsized effect on returns. It rose 0.2% while the S&P 500 fell.

Seven of the 11 sector funds closed higher. The State Street Consumer Staples Select Sector SPDR ETF XLP rose 1.4%, the best of the pack.

For the week, the S&P 500 rose 2.5% the Nasdaq Composite 2.3% and the Dow 2.1%, the Nasdaq’s best week since August.

SMH rose 4.9% and QQQ 3.6%. AMD finished the week up 18.9%, and Broadcom 18.2%, while Nvidia fell 12.7%.

Most of the gain came Monday, Nov. 9, when the S&P 500 rose 2.3% and AMD rose 13.3% after Nvidia’s board announced its investigation. On Tuesday, a hotter-than-expected October consumer price index pushed Treasury yields higher, and the S&P 500 fell 0.4%. On Wednesday, chip stocks rose on CoreWeave’s outlook, and the S&P 500 gained 1.3%.

The producer price index for final demand, which measures prices U.S. businesses receive for goods and services, rose 0.3% in October, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said. Forecasters had expected 0.4%. BLS revised September’s increase to 1.4% from 1.3%. Goods prices rose 0.5% and services prices 0.2%.

Over the 12 months through October, producer prices rose 6.5%, up from 6.3% in September and the largest 12-month increase since November 2022. Core producer prices, which exclude food, energy and trade services, rose 0.5% for the month and 4.9% from a year earlier.

Treasuries and interest rates

The 10-year Treasury yield ended near 5.13% Friday after jumping more than 13 basis points on Thursday to above 5%. A basis point is one-hundredth of a percentage point. CNBC reported that traders added bets on a Federal Reserve rate increase in December. Yahoo Finance attributed Friday’s move from technology stocks into defensive sectors to rising yields and uncertainty about the AI industry.

What to watch for

Nvidia reports fiscal third-quarter results after the market closes Tuesday, Nov. 17, its first report since Huang resigned. Kress will post written commentary before the 5 p.m. ET call.

The Fed releases minutes of its Oct. 27-28 meeting Wednesday at 2 p.m. ET, with traders pricing a possible December rate increase. The Commerce Department reports October retail sales Tuesday at 8:30 a.m. ET.

Four major retailers report before the market opens:

Home Depot reports Tuesday, Nov. 17, and holds its call at 9 a.m. ET.

Target and Lowe’s report Wednesday, Nov. 18, with calls at 8 a.m. and 9 a.m. ET.

Walmart reports Thursday, Nov. 19, and holds its call at 8 a.m. ET. In the past, Walmart released results an hour before the call. For example, it released its Nov. 20, 2025, results at 6 a.m. CST, which is 7 a.m. ET.