Stocks slip as the 10-year yield tops 5.1%: S&P 500 -0.35%, Nvidia -4.3%, AMD +5.9%

Wall Street ended a lopsided day with small losses. The S&P 500 fell 0.35% to 7,592.40, the Nasdaq Composite lost 0.39% to 25,366.09 and the Dow dropped 189.40 points, or 0.36%, to 52,297.09, according to CNBC's closing report. The Russell 2000 of small companies did worse, down 1.66% to 2,799.06 on Yahoo Finance data, and the VIX rose 6.9% to 18.70.

Nvidia: down 4.3% after a 10% plunge

Nvidia closed at $166.19, down 4.34% from Wednesday's $173.73. It had been down by double digits after the company said Huang resigned as CEO and director, as our report on the 8-K details. CNBC said the shares touched a 52-week low and that selling pressure eased considerably through the session. Nvidia reports on November 17 with Chief Financial Officer Colette Kress as interim CEO.

The money went next door. AMD closed at $585.30, up 5.9%, and Broadcom at $364.36, up 5.5%. Alphabet, a large buyer of Nvidia chips and a chip designer itself, gained 1.8% to $298.70. Apple touched a record intraday high of $359.37, CNBC reported. Nebius, the AI cloud company, fell 16.8% to $128.64 after raising its capital spending plans, as we reported.

Nvidia is about 6% of the S&P 500, per the weight CNBC used, so its 4.3% fall alone is worth roughly 0.26 of a point (0.06 x 0.0434). That is most of the index's 0.35% decline, and the Dow barely felt it: the Dow is price-weighted, where CNBC says Nvidia counts for only about 2%.

The real signal: bonds reopened

Bond markets were shut Wednesday for Veterans Day, so Thursday was the first chance to price Tuesday's hot inflation report plus hawkish Fed talk. The Treasury's daily curve shows the 10-year at 5.10% versus 4.98% on Tuesday, the 2-year at 4.86% versus 4.73%, and the 30-year at 5.43% versus 5.35%, per the U.S. Treasury.

CNBC, citing the CME FedWatch tool, said fed funds futures were last pricing three quarter-point hikes by March. That would lift the target from 3.75%-4.00% to 4.50%-4.75%. Goldman Sachs economist David Mericle now expects a December hike and a third quarter point in March, CNBC reported.

Who it hits first: anyone with a loan that floats off the Fed's rate. On an example $250,000 floating balance, each quarter point costs $625 a year (0.0025 x $250,000), so three hikes add $1,875 a year. Homebuyers are already feeling it. Existing home sales fell 5.5% in October to a 3.75 million annual pace, the lowest since August 2010 and below the 3.85 million forecast on our economic calendar. Mortgage rates are covered in our Freddie Mac report.

Oil jumps, gold slides

West Texas Intermediate settled up 2.55% at $88.74 a barrel and Brent up 3.3% at $95.82, CNBC said, after President Trump wrote that the US does not need a deal with Iran. Our earlier story has the details. Gold futures fell 3.1% to $3,877.80, from $4,000.50 on Wednesday, as higher yields and a firmer dollar weighed. Bitcoin traded near $71,400 on Coinbase at 4:36 PM ET, down 3.9% over 24 hours.

Weekly jobless claims rose to 200,000 against a 195,000 forecast, a labor market that is cooling at the margin rather than cracking, as we noted.

What to watch

• November 17: retail sales (the calendar shows a 0% forecast after a 0.8% prior reading) and Nvidia's quarterly results after the close.
• Whether the 10-year holds above 5%. The S&P 500 climbed above 7,800 last month with the 10-year above 5.3%, so higher yields have not always stopped stocks, CNBC noted.
• The December 4 payrolls report, then the Fed's December 9 decision and the November CPI report on December 10.

Sources: CNBC; Yahoo Finance (closing prices, percent changes our arithmetic); U.S. Treasury; CME FedWatch via CNBC; National Association of Realtors via CNBC; Coinbase. Figures are as of the close or the time stated and may be revised. This is market information, not investment advice.