US stocks: Wall Street ends sharply down as traders fret about AI disruption

WALL Street ended sharply lower on Tuesday as investors worried about AI creating more competition for software makers, keeping them on edge ahead of quarterly reports from Alphabet and Amazon later this week.

AI heavyweights Nvidia and Microsoft both fell. Alphabet dropped ahead of its report on Wednesday, while Amazon declined ahead of its Thursday report.

Investors in recent months have become pickier about AI-related stocks, looking for companies generating measurable returns from their outsized investments in the new technology.

Wall Street’s attention on Tuesday turned to technology companies that could face steeper competition and lower margins as a result of AI. One catalyst driving those concerns was Anthropic’s launch of a legal tool for its Claude AI chatbot.

“We’re looking at a lot of software names that are seen as companies that may well be disrupted when we start to see the advancement of artificial intelligence. We’re seeing a lot of software companies across the spectrum get hit,” said Art Hogan, chief market strategist at B. Riley Wealth.

Salesforce, Adobe, Synopsys, Datadog, Atlassian and Intuit fell sharply.

AI data firm Palantir bucked the trend, rallying after strong quarterly results late on Monday.

The S&P 500 software and services index fell for a fifth consecutive day.

“We’ve got an expensive market and expectations are really high. Many areas, especially around AI, are priced for perfection. That’s just got us in a skittish environment,” said John Campbell, senior portfolio manager, Allspring Global Investments.

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Healthcare stocks came under pressure after Wegovy maker Novo Nordisk warned that it expected a steep decline in annual sales. The company’s US-listed shares plummeted. Rival Eli Lilly fell, as did obesity drugmakers Viking Therapeutics and Structure Therapeutics.

Walmart climbed to become the first brick-and-mortar retailer ever to hit US$1 trillion in stock market value. Advanced Micro Devices fell ahead of its quarterly report after the bell. Walt Disney dipped after it named theme parks head Josh D’Amaro as CEO, placing a longtime insider at the helm and ending succession uncertainty.

PayPal slumped after it forecast 2026 profit below estimates.

According to preliminary data, the S&P 500 lost 59.04 points, or 0.85 per cent, to end at 6,917.40 points, while the Nasdaq Composite lost 336.20 points, or 1.42 per cent, to 23,255.91. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 170.98 points, or 0.35 per cent, to 49,236.68.

Earnings deluge

With one quarter of the S&P 500 set to report quarterly results this week, analysts expect companies to have grown their earnings nearly 11 per cent in the December quarter, up from an estimate of about 9 per cent at the start of January, according to LSEG data.

Pfizer fell despite posting fourth-quarter profit above estimates, while Merck rose after quarterly results.

PepsiCo shares gained after the company announced price cuts on core brands such as Lay’s and Doritos. Meanwhile, legislation to end a US government shutdown narrowly cleared a procedural hurdle in the House of Representatives, setting up a vote on final passage later in the day.

The partial shutdown has postponed releases of key jobs data on Friday along with the JOLTS report, originally expected on Tuesday. REUTERS