US Stock Outlook | Trump will deliver a national speech or interview Federal Reserve Chairman candidate Waller

Pre-market market trends

1. On December 17 (Wednesday), the futures of the three major US stock indexes rose sharply before the US stock market. As of press release, Dow futures were up 0.23%, S&P 500 futures were up 0.34%, and NASDAQ futures were up 0.44%.

2. As of press release, the German DAX index fell 0.01%, the UK FTSE 100 index rose 1.63%, the French CAC40 index fell 0.15%, and the European Stoxx 50 index rose 0.12%.

3. As of press release, WTI crude oil rose 1.74% to $56.09 per barrel. Brent crude rose 1.63% to $59.88 per barrel.

Market news

Trump said on social media that he will address the nation at 9 p.m. EST on Wednesday (10 a.m. Beijing time on Thursday). This speech comes at a critical moment when Trump's first year in the White House is nearing its end. Public approval ratings are declining, and the economy is facing headwinds. This speech provided Trump with a platform to highlight his political achievements and clarify his priorities for the coming year. The Republican Party will try to maintain control of Congress in November next year's midterm elections. The White House revealed that Trump will deliver speeches on his historic achievements, discuss future prospects, and possibly predict New Year's policies.

Trump is expected to interview Federal Reserve Governor Waller on Wednesday to select the chairman of the Federal Reserve. Trump will be interviewing another candidate for Federal Reserve Chairman — Federal Reserve Governor Christopher Waller on Wednesday, according to people familiar with the matter. Officials said that the relevant process is progressing rapidly, and Trump is still weighing, so the meeting could be postponed or canceled at any time. Last week, Trump interviewed former Federal Reserve Governor Kevin Walsh. Trump said that Walsh, along with US National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett, is his preferred candidate for the position.

Traders are betting that CPI is “irrelevant” on Thursday, and expectations of fluctuations in US stocks plummeted. For the past three years, the US monthly consumer price report has been the federal data that stock traders are extremely concerned about. Today, investors wait for the November inflation report to be released on Thursday, mostly with a sense of indifference rather than the anxiety of the past. Options traders are betting that the S&P 500 will fluctuate 0.7% in either direction, according to data compiled by Barclays. This margin is significantly lower than the 1% average actual fluctuation triggered by the 12 reports up to September.

Trump ordered the blockade of Venezuelan oil tankers, and crude oil prices rebounded from their lowest level in four years. After US President Trump passed an order to block sanctioned oil tankers off the coast of South American countries and put increased pressure on the Venezuelan military and economy, the international crude oil pricing benchmark, the Brent crude oil futures price quickly rebounded from the lowest price level since 2021. Statistics show that Venezuela's own crude oil production has continued to rise since it hit a historic low in 2020, but it is still far below the strong level of a few decades ago. Last month, some Venezuelan tankers loaded nearly 590,000 barrels of crude oil per day for export, while global crude oil consumption exceeded 100 million barrels per day. Most of the country's crude oil flows to China and India.

The US wants to wave the sanctions stick at Russia and pressure Putin to accept the Russian-Ukrainian peace agreement. According to people familiar with the matter, if Russian President Vladimir Putin refuses to reach a peace agreement with Ukraine, the US is preparing to impose a new round of sanctions on the Russian energy sector to increase pressure on Moscow. People familiar with the matter said that the US is considering various plans, such as sanctions against oil tankers in Russia's so-called “shadow fleet,” which are used to transport Russian oil, and traders to assist in these transactions. Some people familiar with the matter said that the new measures may be announced as early as this week. People familiar with the matter said that US Treasury Secretary Bezent met with a group of European ambassadors earlier this week and discussed these plans. After the meeting, Bezent posted on social media platform X: “President Trump is a peaceful president. I repeat that under his leadership, the United States will continue to prioritize ending the war in Ukraine.”

Goldman Sachs: The Federal Reserve is more willing to cut interest rates again next year. Employment data may be the “trigger” for interest rate cuts. Goldman Sachs said that after policy easing this week and Chairman Jerome Powell showing significant caution about labor market risks, the Federal Reserve may be more willing to cut interest rates further next year than the market had previously anticipated. A lower interest rate cut threshold supports a steeper yield curve, putting marginal pressure on the dollar and increasing sensitivity to upcoming labor market data.

Goldman Sachs Asset Management: AI financing concerns are a “false surprise” with trillions of capital expenses “supported” by tech giants. Sung Cho, co-head of Goldman Sachs Asset Management's Open Technology Investment and US Underlying Equity, recently conveyed a central and reassuring message during discussions with Scott Wapner: the artificial intelligence financing anxiety that is common in the current market, usually caused by sharp fluctuations in corporate valuations and perceived fragility, has been greatly exaggerated. When quantifying the huge capital inflows into AI, Cho said, “Considering the total level of spending we need in the next few years, we think it's around $700 billion to $1 trillion. What should be feared is that 90% of this is funded by operating cash flow.”

Individual stock news

Giants conspire for the future of AI: Amazon (AMZN.US) plans to inject $10 billion into OpenAI to accelerate the challenge of Nvidia (NVDA.US) chip hegemony. According to reports, OpenAI is in investment negotiations with Amazon, plans to raise an amount of 10 billion US dollars or more, and is considering using Amazon's AI chips. Previously, OpenAI announced last month that it would spend 38 billion US dollars over the next seven years to rent server resources from AWS, a cloud computing subsidiary of Amazon. If this financing is secured, it will help OpenAI fulfill its long-term commitment to leasing servers to at least five cloud service providers (including AWS). These computing resources are being used to develop its artificial intelligence (AI) models. Three people familiar with the matter said that the two sides have also discussed the possibility of commercial cooperation. According to reports, negotiations began after OpenAI completed the corporate restructuring in October last year — the company paved the way for future public listings by converting its interests into traditional shares. Notably, people familiar with the matter pointed out that the two sides have negotiated the use of Amazon's AI chip. If an agreement is reached, Amazon's self-developed AI training chip Trainium will welcome new customers, and will also help the online retail giant expand its influence in the AI field and compete with Nvidia.

The board of directors of Warner (WBD.US) strongly supports Netflix (NFLX.US) and intends to reject the hostile takeover by Paramount (PSKY.US). Some media quoted information revealed by people familiar with the matter as reporting that Warner Bros. Exploration plans to reject the “hostile takeover offer” made by Paramount Tianmu due to concerns about financing arrangements and other terms. People familiar with the matter said that after reviewing and evaluating Paramount's bid, the Warner Bros. board of directors will urge shareholders to reject the proposed takeover; those familiar with the matter requested anonymity in order to discuss confidential information. They said the board of directors still believes that the value, certainty, and terms provided by the company's existing agreement with streaming leader Netflix are superior to the plan proposed by Paramount Sky Dance.

Performance increased by 30 times! Nvidia (NVDA.US) and SK Hynix are developing AI solid-state drives to be mass-produced in 2027. According to reports, Nvidia and South Korea's SK Hynix are collaborating to develop a solid-state drive (SSD) with artificial intelligence as the core, using NAND chips. This project is codenamed “Storage Next” within Nvidia, and is called “AI-NP” (AI NAND Performance) within SK Hynix, and aims to break the bottleneck on the storage side of the current AI computing power system. This jointly developed AI SSD can be called a leapfrog upgrade in terms of performance indicators. Its core goal is to achieve up to 100 million input/output operations per second (IOPS), which is about 10 times faster than today's top enterprise SSDs, and can even improve performance by up to 30 times in specific environments.

Waymo, an autonomous driving giant owned by Alphabet (GOOGL.US), is seeking financing of more than $15 billion, and the valuation is approaching the 100 billion mark. Waymo, an autonomous driving subsidiary of Google's parent company Alphabet, is in financing negotiations with a consortium led by its parent company and plans to raise more than 15 billion US dollars at a valuation of nearly 100 billion US dollars. According to people familiar with the matter, this leading company in the autonomous taxi sector is discussing equity financing matters with external investors and Alphabet to raise tens of billions of dollars. Some sources pointed out that the two sides have discussed a valuation plan of up to 110 billion US dollars, but the final financing amount and valuation have yet to be finalized.

It only takes two treatments a year! A new drug for GlaxoSmithKline (GSK.US) for asthma was approved by the FDA. GlaxoSmithKline announced that a new drug to treat severe asthma has been approved by US regulations. This progress is expected to pave the way for the drug to become a major product. GlaxoSmithKline said in a statement issued on Wednesday that the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved the new drug Exdensur (depemokimab) as an additional maintenance treatment for severe asthma patients aged 12 and above. Earlier this month, the drug was approved for marketing by the European Medicines Agency, and the UK Drug Supervisory Authority has given it the green light. GlaxoSmithKline revealed that the drug's application for marketing in China and Japan is currently under review. As the first ultra-long-lasting biologic to treat respiratory diseases, Exdensur is administered only twice a year. Clinical trial data shows that the drug can reduce the risk of acute attacks of severe asthma by 54%, while also relieving nasal congestion in patients with chronic sinusitis and reducing the volume of nasal breathing.

Key economic data and event forecasts

At 11:15 Beijing time, Federal Reserve Governor Waller delivered a speech

At 22:00 Beijing time, US President Trump delivered a speech

22:05 Beijing time FOMC Permanent Ticket Committee and New York Federal Reserve Chairman Williams delivered opening remarks at the 2025 Foreign Exchange Market Structure Conference hosted by the New York Federal Reserve

23:30 Beijing time US EIA crude oil inventory changes for the week ending December 12 (10,000 barrels)

At 01:30 a.m. the next day, Beijing time, 2027 FOMC voting committee and Atlanta Federal Reserve Chairman Bostic delivered a speech on the economic outlook