US Pre-Market: US-Iran Conflict Triggers 5% Oil Price Surge; Apple, Broadcom Sign $30 Billion Deal; Memory Chip Stocks Suffer Heavy Losses Again

TradingKey - On July 8, Eastern Time, in pre-market trading, the three major U.S. stock index futures fell again. As of press time, Dow Jones Industrial Average futures fell 0.94%, S&P 500 Index futures fell 0.70%, and Nasdaq 100 Index futures fell 1.03%.

[Source: CME Group]

In commodities, international oil prices surged. As of press time, both WTI and Brent crude rose over 5%, with WTI crude futures trading at $74.33/barrel and Brent crude futures at $78.16/barrel. Gold and silver prices fell under pressure, as spot gold ( XAUUSD) broke below the $4,100/ounce mark again, currently trading at around $4,064/ounce, down about 1%. Spot silver ( XAGUSD) was trading around $58.83/ounce.

In the crypto market, Bitcoin was trading around $62,320, and Ethereum was trading around $1,750.

Market Movement

Memory chip stocks plunged again in pre-market trading. SanDisk ( SNDK) fell nearly 4%, Micron Technology ( MU) dropped over 3%, and Seagate Technology ( STX) and Western Digital ( WDC) fell over 2%. Chip stocks have been under pressure for several consecutive days, as market concerns that "the good news is fully priced in" for memory chips continue to ferment.

Large-cap tech stocks showed mixed performance in pre-market trading. SpaceX ( SPCX) bucked the trend to rise 1.25%, Apple ( AAPL) ticked up 0.22%, while Meta ( META ), Alphabet Class A ( GOOGL ), Microsoft ( MSFT ), Amazon ( AMZN ), Tesla ( TSLA ), and NVIDIA ( NVDA) all fell by about 1%.

Chinese concept stocks staged a long-awaited rally in pre-market trading. Alibaba ( BABA) surged over 9%, Baidu ( BIDU) rose 4.5%, and JD.com ( JD ), Bilibili ( BILI ), and NetEase ( NTES) gained over 2%.

The oil and gas sector generally rose in pre-market trading. Occidental Petroleum ( OXY) and Devon Energy ( DVN) rose over 2%, while ExxonMobil ( XOM) and Chevron ( CVX) climbed over 1%.

Market News

The US-Iran conflict flares up again, with international oil prices surging over 5%. U.S. President Donald Trump stated at the NATO summit on the 8th that he believes the US-Iran memorandum of understanding is "over." The U.S. military has launched a new round of strikes against Iran, hitting over 80 targets, revoking authorizations for Iranian oil sales, and reinstating oil sanctions against Iran. Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf condemned the U.S. action as a "serious violation" of the memorandum. As geopolitical conflict reignites, both WTI and Brent crude surged over 5%, and energy stocks collectively rose pre-market.

Apple and Broadcom reach a multi-year chip agreement worth over $30 billion. Apple Inc. announced a new multi-year partnership agreement with Broadcom ( AVGO) with an estimated total value exceeding $30 billion. The two companies will co-design and manufacture custom chip components and cutting-edge wireless connectivity technologies for various Apple products. The agreement involves manufacturing over 15 billion chips in the U.S., and Broadcom will invest $1.5 billion to expand its Fort Collins, Colorado manufacturing facility. This is part of Apple's previously disclosed $600 billion investment plan in the United States.

Samsung mass-produces the PM1763 enterprise SSD, to be featured in Nvidia's Vera Rubin platform. Samsung Electronics announced the official mass production of the PM1763, an enterprise-grade solid-state drive for next-generation AI computing infrastructure. The product will serve as a core storage component in Nvidia's upcoming Vera Rubin platform. Equipped with Samsung's ninth-generation V-NAND flash memory and a 4nm controller chip, the PM1763 utilizes the PCIe 6.0 protocol, delivering sequential read speeds of up to 28,400 MB/s and write speeds of 21,900 MB/s. It supports liquid cooling solutions and offers various capacity options including 4TB, 8TB, and 16TB.

SpaceX and Cursor to release joint AI model as early as today, targeting Opus 4.8 and GPT-5.5. According to The Information, SpaceX's AI division, SpaceXAI, and coding tool company Cursor plan to release their first jointly developed AI model as early as today (Wednesday). The model was trained from scratch at xAI's Colossus data center, with its core advantage being information processing speed, rivaling Anthropic's Opus 4.8 and OpenAI's GPT-5.5 on certain benchmarks. The release comes as SpaceX progresses with its $60 billion all-stock acquisition of Cursor.

GPT-5.6 cleared for full release this Thursday as regulatory restrictions are lifted. OpenAI announced that the GPT-5.6 series (Sol, Terra, Luna) will be officially opened to the public on Thursday, July 9, Eastern Time. Previously restricted by the U.S. government's executive order on AI safety, the series had only been available in preview to about 20 "trusted partners" since its June 27 release. Following multiple rounds of review with the Department of Commerce's AI Standards and Innovation Center, regulatory hurdles have now been cleared.

Key Events Preview

The sudden escalation of the US-Iran conflict led to soaring oil prices, contrasting sharply with a plunge in chip stocks. Geopolitical risks have returned to the market spotlight, making the energy sector one of the few safe havens. Chinese concepts stocks staged a long-awaited breakout driven by expectations ahead of Alibaba's earnings report, though the sustainability of this rally remains to be seen.

The Federal Reserve will release the minutes of its June monetary policy meeting at 2:00 PM Eastern Time on Wednesday, July 8. This will be the first full set of meeting minutes since Federal Reserve Chair Warsh took office, and the market will look to them for clues on the interest rate path and inflation outlook.