US stock-index futures advanced on Friday as a pullback in Treasury yields gave investors room to add risk before the opening bell, even as the Middle East conflict remained the market’s central geopolitical overhang.

Dow, S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 futures all climbed, helped by gains in megacap technology and chip stocks.

Traders were also weighing signs of progress in US-Iran discussions, the handover at the Federal Reserve and a final reading of May consumer sentiment.

The move followed another strong Wall Street session, with the Dow closing at a record and the S&P 500 extending its weekly winning streak.

5 things to know before market opens

1. Futures climb as yields ease

Dow futures rose 124 points, or 0.25%, while contracts tied to the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 added 0.18% and 0.27%

The yield on the 10-year Treasury note slipped 2.2 basis points to 4.56%, easing one of the main pressures on equity valuations.

2. US-Iran talks steady the risk mood

The advance in futures was also tied to tentative signs that diplomacy may be gaining traction in the Middle East.

Iran’s foreign minister met Pakistan’s interior minister to discuss proposals aimed at ending the nearly three-month-old conflict, while US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said there had been “some good signs” in talks.

Still, Washington and Tehran remain divided over Iran’s uranium stockpile and control of the Strait of Hormuz, keeping oil and inflation risks firmly on investors’ radar.

3. Chips and megacaps recover before the bell

Megacap and semiconductor shares strengthened in premarket trading, extending the AI-led bid that has helped US equities recover to record highs this month.

Nvidia rose 0.7%, even after slipping in the previous session despite issuing a strong quarterly forecast.

Intel, AMD, Marvell Technology and Broadcom gained between 0.9% and 3.2%, showing that investors remain willing to buy into the chip trade when yields move lower.

4. Workday, Estée Lauder and Take-Two lead movers

Workday jumped 11.1% after the enterprise software company beat first-quarter revenue and profit estimates, easing concerns that AI challengers could quickly disrupt demand for traditional software vendors.

The company’s subscription revenue rose 14.3% to $2.35 billion, while adjusted earnings per share of $2.66 topped expectations of $2.51.

Estée Lauder advanced 10.1% after the cosmetics maker and Spanish perfumery group Puig ended merger talks that could have created a roughly $40 billion premium beauty group.

Investors welcomed the decision after analysts had warned that a deal could have stretched Estée Lauder’s balance sheet and distracted management from its turnaround programme.

Take-Two Interactive rose 5% after reaffirming the 19 November 2026 launch date for Grand Theft Auto VI, the most important release in the company’s pipeline.

The stock gained even though the company’s annual bookings forecast came in below Wall Street expectations.

5. Fed transition and sentiment data move into focus

Investors will also watch Washington later in the day, with President Donald Trump expected to swear in Kevin Warsh as Federal Reserve chair.

The handover comes at a sensitive point for markets, with investors debating whether stubborn inflation and higher oil prices will limit the scope for rate cuts.

A final reading of May consumer sentiment is also due, giving traders another check on household confidence after a volatile period for energy prices, bond yields and global risk appetite.

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Anthropic, the Amazon-backed artificial intelligence unicorn, is firing on all cylinders and beating OpenAI, a company that has mapped a plan to spend over $1 trillion in data centers.

Anthropic revenue and profits are soaring

According to the WSJ, its second-quarter revenue is expected to come in at $10.9 billion, more than double what it made in the first quarter. This growth is mostly because more people and companies than ever before are using its Claude platform. 

Most notably, the company is on track to hit its first quarterly profit for the first time ever. Its operating profit is expected to jump to $559 million in the June quarter.

These numbers help to justify its soaring valuation. It recently raised $30 billion at a $900 billion valuation, and chances are that it will be the fastest one to hit a $1 trillion valuation. Indeed, the company’s growth is faster than what Google and Facebook used to experience when they went public.

Anthropic is beating OpenAI

Anthropic and OpenAI have taken different approaches in their operations. It has worked behind the scenes and avoided making major announcements other than its product releases. Also, it has avoided entering highly expensive ventures like video and image generation.

Mythos, its newest model, has sent shockwaves around the world because of its security features. Policymakers are concerned that it can cause vulnerabilities in the financial and other sectors.

OpenAI, on the other hand, has launched several projects, including the now-defunct video generation feature. It has also entered large deals with companies like AMD and Broadcom. It also made partnerships with Oracle, SB Energy, CoreWeave. OpenAI is also part of the Stargate project that seeks to spend over $500 billion in data centers.

READ MORE: Why is OpenAI missing targets even as AI investment hits record highs?

At the same time, the company does not depend on the highly expensive NVIDIA chips. Instead, it focuses on chips by companies like Microsoft and Google that are less expensive. Most importantly, while many consumers use its service, it mainly focuses on corporate customers, allowing it to offer full prices.Looking forward, focus will be on the upcoming OpenAI IPO, which will provide more color on its business. Anthropic will then go public later this year.

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Tesco share price retreated by over 2% on Wednesday, before paring back some of the losses as the UK government pushed retailers to cap price increases amid the ongoing Iran war. It slipped to 443p, its lowest level since February 4, and 10.85% below its highest point this year.

UK government pushes retailers to limit price hikes

Tesco share price pulled back sharply, mirroring the performance of other UK retail groups like Sainsbury’s and Marks and Spencer. 

This retreat happened after the Office of National Statistics (ONS) published an encouraging inflation report. Data shows that the headline and core consumer price index rose at a slower pace than expected in April. However, analysts warn that prices will jump in July when Ofgem revises energy prices.

The main reason why Tesco shares are pulling back is that the UK government is pushing retailers not to hike prices on essential items such as eggs and milk. In return, the government is promising these companies to ease some policies on packaging and healthy eating.

A move to cap price increases would push retailers like Tesco and Sainsbury’s to sell products at a loss. In a statement, the British Retail Consortium (BRC) warned that the policies were unworkable and urged the government to remove taxes that push prices higher.

The government is making these policies at a desperate time when its approval ratings have plunged. There are concerns that Keir Starmer will not finish his term after the last local election in which his party suffered major losses.

Tesco’s market share gains

The most recent results showed that the company’s business is doing well despite the rising competition. Its market share continued growing, as its revenue jumped. It made over 66.5 billion in revenue last year, up by 4.6% YoY. In contrast, the British economy grew by 1.3%.

Its profit before tax rose to over 2.4 billion pounds, while the diluted earnings-per-share (EPS) rose by 15% to 27.1p. As a result, the management continued to return funds to shareholders. It paid 937 million pounds in dividends and repurchased shares worth over 1.45 billion pounds. It has returned over 4.3 billion pounds in capital through buybacks since 2021.

The next main catalyst for the TSCO share price will be the upcoming trading statement that comes out on June 18.

Tesco share price technical analysis

TSCO stock chart | Source: TradingView

The daily chart shows that the TSCO stock is not doing well and is now hovering near its lowest point since February. It has now plunged below the 50-day Exponential Moving Average (EMA).

A closer look shows that the stock has formed a triple-top pattern at 495p, its highest point in February, March, and April this year. A triple-top is one of the most common bearish reversal patterns in technical analysis. It moved slightly below the neckline at 450p and then pulled back.

Therefore, there is a risk that the stock will remain under pressure in the near term. If this happens, it may drop to the key support level at 411p, its lowest point in January this year.

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Blackstone is backing Google’s artificial intelligence ambitions with a major investment in a new data center venture built around Google’s in-house AI chips.

The alternative-asset giant is committing an initial $5 billion in equity to a new US-based AI cloud venture with Google, with plans to bring 500 megawatts of data center capacity online by 2027.

Including leverage, the investment could eventually reach about $25 billion, a Bloomberg report said.

The bet seems enormous as AI compute demand explodes, Google wants its Tensor Processing Units, or TPUs, to become a real alternative to Nvidia’s dominant GPUs.

Google’s Nvidia challenge

The new company is designed around Google’s TPUs, the custom chips it built for artificial intelligence workloads.

That makes the venture more focused than a conventional hyperscale data center project.

It is not simply about adding server capacity, but also about creating a third-party platform where customers can rent access to Google’s AI hardware, software and infrastructure as a service.

That puts the deal closer to the “neocloud” model made popular by companies such as CoreWeave, which built its business around providing AI developers with access to Nvidia-powered compute.

The difference lies in the chips: CoreWeave built its business around Nvidia’s ecosystem, while Google and Blackstone are now trying to create a similar marketplace centered on Google’s TPUs.

For Blackstone, the appeal is obvious as AI infrastructure has become one of the largest capital-deployment opportunities in the world.

Data centers require large amounts of land, power, cooling, fiber connectivity and financing, making infrastructure-focused investors such as Blackstone natural participants in the sector.

Blackstone President Jon Gray framed the deal as a “generational opportunity” to invest in AI infrastructure, saying the new company can help meet unprecedented demand for compute.

Google’s chip bet gets a new route to market

Google’s TPUs are not new, as the company has spent more than a decade developing and using them internally to train and run AI models.

They help power Google’s own products, including Gemini, and are built specifically for AI training and inference rather than general-purpose computing.

What is new is the distribution model.

Historically, Google’s TPUs have been closely tied to Google Cloud. This venture gives them a wider route to customers, backed by Blackstone’s capital and data center development capabilities.

In simple words, Google is trying to make its AI chips easier for outside companies to access without forcing every customer relationship to fit neatly inside the traditional Google Cloud box.

The leadership choice also sends a signal as the venture will be run by Benjamin Treynor Sloss, a longtime Google executive with deep experience in infrastructure and operations.

For Google Cloud, the prize is strategic as Nvidia has become the default supplier for much of the AI boom.

But cloud providers increasingly want more control over the hardware stack, both to reduce costs and to differentiate their platforms.

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Chinese electric vehicle maker XPeng said on Monday it had started mass production of its first robotaxi at its Guangzhou headquarters, as the company accelerates efforts to expand its autonomous driving business amid rising competition in China’s electric vehicle market.

The company said the robotaxi is built on its GX platform and is China’s first production-ready, pre-assembled robotaxi model developed entirely with in-house technologies.

The development marks a significant step in XPeng’s broader strategy to strengthen its presence in autonomous driving, driverless mobility, and robotics technologies.

XPeng targets fully driverless operations by 2027

XPeng said it is aiming to begin fully driverless robotaxi operations by early 2027.

The company plans to launch pilot robotaxi operations during the second half of this year as it prepares for wider deployment in the coming years.

The move comes as Chinese electric vehicle makers continue to invest heavily in autonomous driving technologies to differentiate themselves in an increasingly competitive market.

XPeng, often viewed as a rival to Tesla, has increasingly shifted focus beyond conventional electric vehicles into advanced mobility technologies, including autonomous transport systems, humanoid robotics, and flying vehicle concepts.

Last month, XPeng President Brian Gu told that the company would likely produce hundreds to thousands of robotaxis over the next 12 to 18 months.

The company’s latest production milestone indicates that XPeng is moving from development and testing phases toward scaled commercial deployment.

Company expands AI and autonomous driving ecosystem

Founded in 2014 and headquartered in Guangzhou, XPeng has positioned itself as a smart electric vehicle manufacturer focused on artificial intelligence-driven mobility systems.

The company is widely recognised for integrating advanced autonomous driving software and AI-powered smart cockpit technologies into its vehicles.

XPeng’s vehicles run high-level AI models, including VLA 2.0, which are designed to handle complex road conditions such as heavy traffic, roundabouts, and highway ramps without human intervention.

Beyond passenger electric vehicles, the company is also investing in humanoid robotics and road-capable flying car technologies as part of its broader smart mobility ecosystem.

The robotaxi initiative is considered a key part of that long-term strategy.

XPeng broadens product lineup and international reach

XPeng currently offers a range of smart electric vehicles across multiple segments.

Its lineup includes the flagship P7 sedan, the G9 SUV, the X9 MPV, and the budget-focused Mona M03.

While the company initially focused on China’s domestic market, it has expanded internationally in recent years.

XPeng now sells vehicles in Europe and Australia and is also exploring expansion into emerging markets, including India.

The company is publicly traded on both the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker XPEV and the Hong Kong Stock Exchange under the ticker 9868.

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Zeta Global stock price jumped by over 4% on Friday in a high-volume environment after the company joined the Open Semantic Exchange (OSI), an initiative by Snowflake. ZETA jumped to $17.6, its highest point since May 7 as focus shifts to the upcoming JPM Global Technology, Media, and Communications Conference.

Zeta Global stock jumped after joining OSI

Data shows that Zeta Global was in high demand on Friday, as over 6.9 million shares exchanged hands. The three-month daily average volume was about 8 million.

ZETA, a company that provides AI marketing cloud solutions to some of the largest companies, announced that it joined OSI. OSI is a universal specification for all companies to standardize their fragmented data definitions with an open, vendor-neutral semantic model.

The entry will enable the company improve its services, especially now in the artificial intelligence (AI) era. It will help to align on a common foundation for how business metrics are defined and shared. 

Zeta Global stock also jumped after the company confirmed that it will participate in a major conference on Monday. Some of the top other companies set to attend are DigitalOcean, Lattice Semiconductor, IMAX, and Outfront Media. 

These events are happening after the company published strong financial results. It was its 19th consecutive quarter of a “beat and raise.” Its revenue jumped by 50% in the first quarter to $396 million, a sign that demand is continuing to grow. 

Zeta Global’s cash from operations jumped by 43% to $50 million, while the adjusted EBITDA rose by 42% to $66 million. 9 out of the ten verticals it focuses on grew in the last quarter.

Zeta continued to add customers during the quarter. It had six consecutive quarters of sequential super-scaled customeer growth, ending the quarter with 189. Its average revenue per user (ARPU) rose to $1.7.

The company now expects its growth will continue in the coming years. Its guidance is that its revenue will jump to $2.3 billion in 2028, from the estimated $1.78 billion this year. The adjusted EBITDA is expected to move from $397 million this year to $573 million in 2028, while its FCF is expected to jump to $371 million.

Analysts have a bullish outlook of the Zeta stock. The consensus target is $28.33, up by 64% from the current level. Some of the recent upgrades came from companies like B. Riley, Royal Bank of Canada, KeyCorp, and Goldman Sachs.

Zeta Global stock price technical analysis 

ZETA stock chart | Source: TradingView

The daily chart shows that the ZETA share price formed a double-bottom pattern at $14.60, its lowest level in February and March this year. Its neckline was at $19.40, its highest point on March 5. 

The stock jumped to a high of $20 after its earnings and then pulled back to $15.50. It then jumped last week after its OSI announcement, and is attempting to move above the 50-day Exponential Moving Average (EMA). 

ZETA is also attempting to rise above the 50% Fibonacci Retracement level. Therefore, the most likely scenario is where the stock will remain inside the support at $14.60 and the resistance at $19.40 in the near term. A move above the resistance will point to more gains, potentially to $25. 

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