Stock market news for Oct. 9, 2025

The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite pulled back from fresh all-time intraday highs on Thursday, with both indexes taking a breather from their gains in the previous session as the U.S. government shutdown continues on.

The broad market index dropped 0.28% to close at 6,735.11, while the tech-heavy index slid 0.08% to finish at 23,024.63. At their highs of the day, the S&P 500 added 0.2%, and the Nasdaq was up 0.1%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average, meanwhile, declined 243.36 points, or 0.52%, to close at 46,358.42.

Both the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq were coming off a record-setting session Wednesday, with the former notching its eighth winning day of the last nine and the latter ending above the 23,000 mark for the first time ever. The Dow, on the other hand, finished slightly below flat Wednesday as blue-chip stocks lagged. But Nvidia helped the 30-stock index restrict losses, rising more than 2% in the prior trading day after CEO Jensen Huang told CNBC that computing demand has “gone up substantially” this year.

“Obviously the market has had a relentless surge from the April meltdowns that keep showing signs that some people believe that the stock market is overheated, making calls for some type of breather at a time when the classic dip buying strategy continues to remain firmly in place,” said David Wagner, head of equities at Aptus Capital Advisors. “This market just continues to grind up. It’s just some under-the-hood rotation going on that can cause some intraday volatility or effect.”

Software vender Oracle was a bright spot Thursday, along with fellow AI play Nvidia, which secured a new all-time high. The two names moved 3% and almost 2% higher, respectively. The pair had suffered losses earlier this week after a report said that Oracle’s cloud business is suffering from thinner margins as it faces challenges with renting out Nvidia chips.

“The market is trying to dissect or decipher which partnerships are going to see the best return on invested capital, and you’re seeing a rotation amongst some of those players that seem to have that circularity theme,” Wagner also said.

Investors were eyeing the latest developments with the current government shutdown, which moved into its ninth day Thursday. The Senate failed for a seventh time to pass dueling funding proposals, with little sign that Republicans and Democrats are making progress on negotiations. Those on Wall Street are watching to see if the stoppage will hit the U.S. economy, and some impacts may have already started to materialize.

On Wednesday, the IRS said that it was going to furlough nearly half of its workforce as a result of the shutdown. On top of that, a shortage of air traffic controllers has led the Federal Aviation Administration to delay U.S. flights.

Delta Air Lines CEO Ed Bastian told CNBC Thursday that while he hasn’t seen “any impacts at all” from the shutdown, “some impacts” could begin to appear “if this doesn’t get resolved, say beyond another 10 days or so.” The stock was a winner during Thursday’s session, jumping 4% on better-than-expected earnings.

Costco was another gainer of the day, as shares rose 3% after the big-box retailer delivered solid September sales data. Tom Hainlin of U.S. Bank Asset Management believes that Delta’s and Costco’s reports are evidence of a resilient consumer in an uncertain macroeconomic environment.

“You can kind of see in real time whether there’s an inflection point in what the consumers are doing, and we haven’t seen it yet,” the firm’s national investment strategist said to CNBC.