The Russell 2000 small-cap<\/a> index gained 1.6% and hit an intraday high during the session that topped its prior record closing high from Nov. 2021. Companies with smaller capitalizations tend to benefit from lower interest rates<\/a> \u2014 which lead to lower borrowing costs \u2014 as they often rely more on external funding for their operations and growth compared to larger, cash-rich firms. <\/p>\n Stock Chart IconStock chart icon Russell 2000 performance over the past five years.<\/p>\n Shares of several major tech companies, which also tend to outperform in lower rate environments, gained during Thursday trading. Intel<\/a> shares rallied about 26% after Nvidia<\/a> said it will invest $5 billion in the chipmaker<\/a> to co-develop data center and PC products. Shares of Nvidia jumped more than 3%. Palantir<\/a> and Micron<\/a> notably rose more than 4%, and Google parent Alphabet<\/a> and Tesla<\/a> also edged higher.<\/p>\n The moves follow a volatile day of trading Wednesday after the Fed, as anticipated, slashed its benchmark rate by a quarter percentage point<\/a>. The Dow Jones Industrial Average<\/a> was the lone gainer, rising 260 points, or about 0.6%, while the S&P 500<\/a> and the Nasdaq Composite<\/a> ended the session in the red.<\/p>\n During a news conference<\/a> following the decision, Fed Chair Jerome Powell put a damper<\/a> on investor hopes that the central bank would be on a lengthy rate-cutting path this year, as he called the latest cut “risk management.” In fact, policymakers are predicting two more reductions this year, but just one in 2026<\/a>, while traders had priced in two to three more cuts next year.<\/p>\n “While we don’t expect the political pressure on Powell to subside now that he has cut interest rates, we do expect investors to re-focus on fundamentals going forward,” said Robert Schein, chief investment officer of Blanke Schein Wealth Management. “Market participants can now re-focus their attention on deregulation, earnings, the thawing of the IPO market and the remaining trade negotiations that are taking place.”<\/p>\n “Now that rates have been moving lower and the Federal Reserve is looking to cut rates a few more times, we are even more bullish on big tech and financials stocks,” Schein added.<\/p>\n Despite Wednesday’s losses, the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq are still headed for weekly gains, up 0.9% and 1.7% in the period, respectively. That puts the broad-market index on pace for its sixth positive week in seven and the tech-heavy Nasdaq on track for its third positive week in a row. The Dow is up 0.7% this week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange during morning trading on Sept. 17, 2025…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":433992,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3091],"tags":[15249,124847,40213,4959,61695,51,3085,147361,125319,7989,24840,17178,2441,15250,125321,3742,8572,34813,16678,125320,3741,1831,15254,16,15,49],"class_list":{"0":"post-433991","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-markets","8":"tag-advanced-micro-devices-inc","9":"tag-alphabet-class-a","10":"tag-alphabet-class-c","11":"tag-breaking-news-markets","12":"tag-broadcom-inc","13":"tag-business","14":"tag-business-news","15":"tag-cracker-barrel-old-country-store-inc","16":"tag-dow-jones-fut-sep25","17":"tag-dow-jones-industrial-average","18":"tag-intel-corp","19":"tag-jerome-powell","20":"tag-markets","21":"tag-micron-technology-inc","22":"tag-nasdaq-100-fut-sep25","23":"tag-nasdaq-composite","24":"tag-nvidia-corp","25":"tag-palantir-technologies-inc","26":"tag-prices","27":"tag-sp-500-fut-sep25","28":"tag-sp-500-index","29":"tag-stock-markets","30":"tag-tesla-inc","31":"tag-uk","32":"tag-united-kingdom","33":"tag-united-states"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115226235593524526","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433991","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=433991"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433991\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/433992"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=433991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=433991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=433991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"hide](\"https:\/\/static-redesign.cnbcfm.com\/dist\/a54b41835a8b60db28c2.svg\")
<\/p>\n