5 things to know before the stock market opens on Thursday

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Here are five important things investors need to know to start their trading day.

Tariffs are back in the spotlight for investors and policymakers alike as the U.S.-China rare earth dispute reignites trade war concerns. Stocks have been volatile in recent days as traders bet on whether President Donald Trump will walk back on his threats, following what some are calling a “TACO” strategy.

Here are the latest updates:

of Dow The price fluctuated more than 650 points between yesterday’s high and low. S&P500 After rising as much as 1.2% early in the session, it ended the day up just 0.4%. of Nasdaq However, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told CNBC that the stock market decline will not deter the United States from putting pressure on China. Watch Bessent’s full interview on CNBC’s Invest in America Forum. Meanwhile, Federal Reserve President Stephen Milan told CNBC that the trade dispute raises concerns about economic growth, which is another reason for the Fed to cut interest rates. The Fed’s Beige Book report released yesterday showed that tariffs are pushing up inflation and consumers are feeling the pinch. The report said overall economic growth was “virtually unchanged” from its previous edition in early September. The Supreme Court is set to hear oral arguments next month in a case that could decide the fate of many of the Trump administration’s most expensive tariffs, and President Trump said yesterday that he may attend. He will be the first sitting president to appear before the nation’s highest court, CNBC’s Kevin Browninger reported. Follow us here for live market updates.

A federal judge yesterday blocked President Trump from firing federal employees during the government shutdown, at least for now. San Francisco U.S. District Judge Susan Yvonne Illston’s temporary restraining order prevents the White House from taking any steps to carry out the layoffs or firing other federal employees protected by the unions that brought the lawsuit.

The ruling comes days after the Trump administration began sending troop reduction notices to more than 4,000 federal employees. White House Budget Director Russell Vought said yesterday that more than 10,000 total cuts are expected.

The closure is currently in its 16th day with no end in sight. The Senate rejected the stopgap funding bill for the ninth time yesterday.

apple Yesterday, we announced new MacBook Pro, iPad Pro, and Vision Pro models, and this is our latest release after announcing new iPhone 17 and watch models last month. All new products are powered by Apple’s latest M5 chip, which the company says has four times the peak computing performance of its predecessor.

On the software side, artificial intelligence startup Anthropic has announced a smaller, cheaper AI model for all users called Claude Haiku 4.5. Meanwhile, rival OpenAI has faced criticism for its decision to allow content such as erotica on ChatGPT. CEO Sam Altman defended the move yesterday, saying OpenAI is “not the world’s elected morality police.”

Legacy automakers are sounding the alarm on the electric vehicle business, but tesla remains almost silent.

Tesla is the clear leader in the U.S. EV market, but the company has given up market share amid increased competition and declining brand value, CNBC’s Laura Kolodny reports. The broader EV industry also no longer benefits from the expiration of the $7,500 tax credit that helped boost consumer interest.

With its quarterly earnings report due next week, Wall Street will be watching to see if Tesla, or its notoriously opinionated CEO Elon Musk, will report similar challenges to its competitors.

With what feels like new multibillion-dollar technology deals happening every day, it’s hard to keep track of who’s paying whom for what. This is a visualization of the $1 trillion web of artificial intelligence transactions.

— CNBC’s Jeff Cox, Dan Mangan, Liz Napolitano, Leslie Josephs, Kif Leswing, Ashley Caputo, Laura Kolodny, Jonathan Bunyan, Magdalena Petrova, Jordan Nove, Kevin Browninger and Lillian Rizzo contributed to this report. Josephine Rozzelle edited this version.