Stock futures are lower in Thursday’s early trading, with the S&P (/ES) down about -0.2% and the small-cap Russell (/RTY) down -0.4%.

China plans to approve imports of Nvidia’s H200 artificial intelligence chips as soon as this quarter which could offer renewed access to this massive customer base, according to news reports.

The defense sector (LMT, NOC, RTX) faced a day of whipsaw trading after President Trump first pledged to block their dividends and stock buybacks due to excessive executive pay until they increase production, but then later said he wanted to hike U.S. military spending by 50% to $1.5 trillion.

There is plenty of economic data on tap today, including Jobless Claims, Challenger Job Cuts, and Balance of Trade.

Snapshot (as of 7 AM ET)

• Oil (/CL) – Oil prices are up around 1.5% to $56.80.
• Gold (/GC) – Gold is down -0.6% near 4,432 as yesterday’s -0.85% slide continues.
• Bitcoin (/BTC) – The cryptocurrency is down -1.2% around 90,000 after dropping -2.38% yesterday.
• VIX – The VIX finished at 15.38 yesterday, which is its first close above 15 since Dec. 18.
• U.S. Dollar (/DX) – The greenback is up +0.1% at about 98.5, after a +0.15% move yesterday.

Biggest Premarket Movers (as of 7 AM ET - Mark % Change)

1. Northrup Grumman (NOC): +8.32%
2. Lockheed Martin (LMT): +8.05%
3. L3Harris (LHX): +7.21%
4. General Dynamics (GD): +6.18%
5. RTX (RTX): +4.78%

1. Newmont (NEM): -2.14%
2. Darden Restaurants (DRI): -1.39%
3. Intuit (INTU): -1.33%
4. Applovin (APP): -1.30%
5. AbbVie (ABBV): -1.25%

Economic Data

• 8:00 AM ET: Fed’s Miran Speaks
• 8:30 AM ET: Weekly Jobless Claims, 3Q Productivity, Trade Deficit
• 10:00 AM ET: Fed’s Miran Speaks
• 3:00 PM ET: Consumer Credit

Notable Earnings

• Premarket: HELE
• Postmarket: TLRY
• Premarket Tomorrow: None
• Postmarket Tomorrow: None

Upgrades/Downgrades

• Cantor Fitzgerald upgrades Alphabet (GOOGL) to Overweight from Neutral
• Wolfe Research upgrades Merck (MRK) to Outperform from Peer Perform
• Barclays upgrades Progressive (PGR) to Overweight from Equal Weight
• Wolfe Research downgrades AbbVie (ABBV) to Peer Perform from Outperform
• Wells Fargo downgrades Intuit (INTU) to Equal Weight from Overweight
• Baird downgrades Prologis (PLD) to Neutral from Outperform

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