US Stock Market Today: Tech Shares Drag S&P 500, Nasdaq Lower; Defense Stocks Soar

The main US stock market indices opened lower on Thursday after investors engaged in profit booking for tech stocks.

The S&P 500 opened 0.11% or 7.68 points lower at 6,913.25, tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite declined 0.25% or 59.26 points to open at 23,525.01, and Dow Jones Industrial Average opened 0.23% or 113.69 points lower at 48,882.39.

As of 10 a.m. EST, Dow Jones pared gains to trade 0.14% higher at 49,051.33, while S&P 500 and Nasdaq continued to trade 0.22% and 0.96% lower at 6,905.61 and 23,358.16 respectively.

Of the magnificent seven, tech stocks like Nvidia Corp., Microsoft Corp., and Meta Platforms Inc. traded lower. Nvidia declined over 1% to trade at $186.15, and Microsoft also traded 1% lower at $478.61.

In sharp contrast to the broader market sentiment, defense stocks such as Northrop Grumman Corp., Lockheed Martin Corp. rallied following US President Donald Trump's indication to increase military spending to $1.5 trillion in 2027.

Lockheed surged nearly 9% to $539.34 while Northrop traded 9% higher at $627.93. Shares of Kratos Defense & Security Solutions Inc. soared over 16% higher to trade at $106.38.

Northrop jumped had jumped 10% by 10 a.m. local time, Lockheed traded over 7% higher, and Kratos was trading 13% higher.

Besides Nvidia and Microsoft, the rest of the magnificent seven stocks traded mixed with Apple Inc. down 1.32% to $256.97, Google-parent Alphabet Inc. up 0.25% at $321 and Amazon Inc. trading 0.79% higher at $243.24.

Spot gold prices were trading 0.50% lower at $4,434 an ounce. In the crude basket, US West Texas Intermediate traded 1.75% higher at $56.97 a barrel and Brent crude traded 1.80% higher at $61.04 a barrel.

The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index strengthened against global currencies to rise 0.2%.The euro fell 0.1% to $1.1659, British pound fell 0.3% to $1.3423, and the Japanese yen fell 0.1% to 156.98 per dollar.

Bitcoin, the largest traded cryptocurrency, rose 1.7% to $89,426.85.