The Week After the AI Wipeout: Chip Stocks Bounced, the Damage Didn't Undo — and a Democratic Congress Is the Next Test
The Nasdaq ended election week down 3.4% and still in correction, while the chip index finished about 12% lower. Here is who got hit hardest, why investors blame the new majorities, and what President Trump's "they are GOLD" stand on data centers means for the next two years.
By Clara Hughes
Friday's bounce felt good. The week's scoreboard did not. After Thursday's AI-driven wipeout, the Nasdaq Composite rose 1.09% Friday to close at 24,579.42, UPI and CNBC reported. The S&P 500 gained 0.31% to 7,376.86. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 237.33 points, or 0.46%, to 51,285.73. For the full week, the S&P 500 lost 2.7% — its biggest weekly decline since early April 2025 — while the Nasdaq dropped 3.4% and the Dow slipped 0.9%. All three major averages logged a fourth straight weekly loss, UPI reported. The semiconductor sector tells the sharper story. The PHLX Semiconductor Index rose 4.21% Friday but still finished 12.15% below its Oct. 30 close, according to closing-price calculations by the markets site Daily Cortex. The Nasdaq ended the week 10.9% below its Oct. 6 record close, The Company Chronicle calculated from Yahoo Finance data — so the correction label still stands. Wednesday's post-election rally is a memory. What replaced it is a question investors will be asking until January: what does a Democratic Congress actually do to the AI build-out? Keep reading with Altas Premium. Below: the suppliers-versus-buyers split inside the AI trade, the Microsoft "neocloud" pullback, the specific bills Democrats say they will file, why the veto still matters,