JPMorgan Chase & Co (NYSE:JPM) shares are lower Monday afternoon, falling as investors dumped financials amid a broad sell-off tied to mounting worries over private credit and AI-linked credit risks.
The broader State Street Financial SPDR ETF (NYSE:XLF) dropped more than 3%, with big banks and asset managers leading declines.
https://www.benzinga.com/trading-ideas/movers/26/02/50799335/jpmorgan-slides-as-credit-fears-grow
Reported rinzimetostat (formerly ORIC-944) Phase 1b data that continue to demonstrate potential best-in-class efficacy and safety in mCRPC; selected provisional RP2Ds and initiated dose optimization in combination with AR inhibitors
Presented potential best-in-class enozertinib Phase 1b data demonstrating highly competitive systemic and intracranial activity in NSCLC patients with EGFR exon 20 and EGFR PACC mutations; selected Phase 3 monotherapy dose
Raised $264 million from top-tier healthcare specialist funds; Cash and investments expected to provide runway into 2H 2028 and beyond anticipated primary endpoint readout for rinzimetostat Phase 3 study
Expect to report multiple clinical data readouts for rinzimetostat and enozertinib in 2026, ahead of potential initiation of multiple registrational trials
Cantor Fitzgerald's recent presentation suggests a prime setup for stocks to rally higher after recent investor pullbacks from AI worries.
In their February 23, 2026 bi-weekly note, they point to spikes in put buying, fear gauges, and falling optimism as classic contrarian buy signals amid strong fundamentals like earnings beats and buybacks. Eric Johnston of Cantor said, "This provides a very good set up for the next leg of the rally considering the fundamental back drop is quite strong."
Cantor crunched data back to 1955 and found that in every one of 21 years with GDP growth over 2.25% and no Fed rate hikes, the S&P 500 climbed, with an average return of 19.6%.
They expect this "extremely high" likelihood in 2026 from AI spending booms (Mag7 capex jumping to $650B from $382B), onshoring, tax cuts adding 90 bps to GDP, and Fed easing, according to Johnston.
Cantor loves mega-cap tech and software stocks now, hit by cash flow fears and AI disruption but trading at oversold levels, like the Nasdaq's PEG ratio at a 10-year low and Mag7 outperforming S&P 500 at a cheap RSI of 23.75. They're also sticking with bonds as inflation cools via falling wages, housing costs, and lapped tariffs, calling them a smart hedge, the strategists noted.
Broader positives include S&P 500 earnings forecasts rising to $320/share, equal-weight profit margins expanding via AI, a shrinking budget deficit (to 5.2% of GDP in 2025), weak job growth outside healthcare, and upbeat consumer sales. Johnston's team stays "bullish Bitcoin" too, post recent de-risking, with easy money and liquidity tailwinds ahead.
IonQ (NYSE: IONQ) is pleased to announce it was awarded a contract under the Missile Defense Agency Scalable Homeland Innovative Enterprise Layered Defense (SHIELD) indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) contract with a ceiling of $151 billion. This contract encompasses a broad range of work areas that allows for the rapid delivery of innovative capabilities to the warfighter with increased speed and agility.
IonQ is among more than 2,400 companies eligible to compete for future task orders issued under the SHIELD IDIQ contract framework.
IonQ delivers a full portfolio of quantum technologies spanning quantum computing, quantum networking, quantum sensing, and quantum security. The company also includes subsidiaries with established capabilities across space-based intelligence, secure communications, and precision timing technologies.
IonQ’s subsidiary companies include Capella Space,which provides on-demand, all-weather synthetic aperture radar imagery from space to support data-driven decision-making for operational and security missions; Skyloom, which delivers high-capacity optical communications technologies designed to enable secure, high-speed data transfer between space and ground systems; and Vector Atomic, which develops precision timing and navigation technologies designed to support system performance in GPS-degraded or denied environments.
https://www.ionq.com/news/ionq-selected-to-support-missile-defense-agency-shield-idiq-contract
The European Parliament decided on Monday to postpone for a second time a vote on the European Union’s trade deal with the United States after President Trump’s imposition of a new blanket 15% import tariff.
The EU assembly has been debating legislative proposals to remove many EU import duties on US goods, a key part of the deal struck in Turnberry, Scotland, last July, as well as to continue zero duties for US lobsters, initially agreed with Trump in 2020. The proposals require approval by the parliament and EU governments.
Parliament’s trade committee has now postponed a vote planned for Tuesday. Bernd Lange, the committee chair, said the new temporary US tariff could mean increased levies for some EU exports and no one knew what would happen after they expire in 150 days.
EU lawmakers will reconvene on March 4 to assess if the United States had clarified the situation and confirmed its commitment to last year’s deal.
This is the second such suspension by lawmakers, who last month halted their work on the deal in protest at Trump’s demands to acquire Greenland.
Many lawmakers have complained that the deal itself is lopsided. However, they had appeared willing to accept it, albeit with conditions, such as an 18-month sunset clause and measures to respond to possible surges of US imports.
The trade deal sets a 15% US tariff rate for most EU goods, apart from those covered by other sectoral tariffs such as on steel, with zero tariffs on some products such as aircraft and spare parts. The EU committed to remove import duties on many US goods.
It is not clear whether Trump’s new 15% tariff supersedes the deal. If it does, the EU’s zero tariff exemptions could disappear.
The new tariffs could also be placed on top of pre-existing ‘most-favored-nation’ US duties, which is not the case under the EU-US deal. So for some cheeses, the new 15% surcharge could bring the overall tariff to about 30%.
Lange said this could mean some 7-8% of EU products facing tariffs above the rates agreed last year.
