Overnight US stocks | Three major indices fell, with the S&P 500 index falling for three consecutive days. Tesla, Inc. (TSLA.US) dropped more than 1%.

On Tuesday, the three major indices fell, with the S&P 500 index falling for the third consecutive trading day. Bitcoin failed to break through the 90,000 mark once again. The latest minutes from the December monetary policy meeting of the Federal Reserve show that most officials believe that further interest rate cuts would be appropriate if inflation falls back as expected over time. However, some officials also explicitly state that they believe rates should remain unchanged "for a period of time" after the December meeting. US StocksAt the close, the Dow fell 94.87 points, or 0.20%, to 48367.06 points; the Nasdaq fell 55.27 points, or 0.24%, to 23419.08 points; the S&P 500 index fell 9.50 points, or 0.14%, to 6896.24 points. Tesla, Inc. (TSLA.US) fell more than 1%, Intel Corporation (INTC.US) rose 1.7%, NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA.US) fell 0.3%. The Nasdaq Golden Dragon Index rose and fell by 0.26%, Baidu Inc Sponsored ADR Class A (BIDU.US) rose 4.4%, XPeng, Inc. ADR Sponsored Class A (XPEV.US) rose 3.7%. European StocksThe DAX30 index in Germany rose 271.31 points, or 1.11%, to 24636.23 points; the FTSE 100 index in the UK rose 77.60 points, or 0.79%, to 9944.13 points; the CAC40 index in France rose 56.13 points, or 0.69%, to 8168.15 points; the Euro Stoxx 50 index rose 43.74 points, or 0.76%, to 5795.45 points; the IBEX35 index in Spain rose 155.82 points, or 0.91%, to 17351.62 points; the FTSE MIB index in Italy rose 528.49 points, or 1.19%, to 44964.50 points. Asia-Pacific StocksThe Nikkei 225 index fell by 0.37%, the KOSPI index in South Korea fell by 0.15%, the BSE SENSEX in India fell slightly, and the Indonesia Composite Index rose slightly. ForexThe US Dollar Index, which measures the dollar against six major currencies, rose 0.21% on the day, closing at 98.241 in the forex market. At the close of the New York forex market, 1 euro exchanged for 1.1747 US dollars, lower than the previous trading day's 1.1767 US dollars; 1 pound exchanged for 1.3466 US dollars, lower than the previous trading day's 1.3507 US dollars. 1 US dollar exchanged for 156.49 Japanese yen, higher than the previous trading day's 156.03 Japanese yen; 1 US dollar exchanged for 0.7917 Swiss francs, higher than the previous trading day's 0.7896 Swiss francs; 1 US dollar exchanged for 1.3696 Canadian dollars, higher than the previous trading day's 1.3684 Canadian dollars; 1 US dollar exchanged for 9.1996 Swedish krona, higher than the previous trading day's 9.1802 Swedish krona. CryptocurrencyBitcoin rose more than 1.3%, to 88,396.44 US dollars; Ethereum rose more than 1%, to 2970 US dollars. Precious MetalsSpot gold rose 0.17%, to 4338.83 US dollars; spot silver rose 0.05%, to 76.257 US dollars. Crude OilLight crude oil futures for delivery in February 2026 on the New York Mercantile Exchange fell by 13 cents, closing at 57.95 US dollars per barrel, a decrease of 0.22%; Brent crude oil futures for delivery in February fell by 2 cents, closing at 61.92 US dollars per barrel, a decrease of 0.03%. Macro News Some Federal Reserve officials are cautious about further rate cuts early next year. According to minutes released on Tuesday, when the Federal Reserve held a meeting this month and decided to cut interest rates, some officials expressed reluctance to support further easing of policy in the near term, indicating that there may be resistance to further rate cuts at the next meeting in January. The minutes show that as the duration of rising prices is longer than expected by the Federal Reserve, the decision to cut rates has become increasingly difficult. Since the December meeting, more economic data has been released, showing that strong consumer spending has helped drive robust economic growth, despite a slight increase in unemployment. New data to be released next month may reshape officials' thinking before the late January rate meeting. Federal Reserve meeting minutes: Participants generally expect the short-term inflation rate to remain at elevated levels. Minutes from the Federal Reserve's December meeting mentioned that participants generally expect inflation to remain at elevated levels in the short term and then gradually decline to 2%. Many participants emphasize that they expect the impact of tariffs on core goods inflation to weaken, but some participants express uncertainty about when these impact will weaken and the extent to which tariffs will eventually be passed on to final goods prices. Some participants report that their business contacts have reported ongoing cost pressures unrelated to tariffs, but some of them point out that soft demand limits some companies' ability to raise prices, or that increased productivity may allow some companies to cope with these cost pressures. Most participants expect housing services inflation to continue to decline, while a few expect core non-housing services inflation to also continue to decline. Participants generally believe that inflation risks still tilt to the upside, although some participants indicate that they believe these upside risks have diminished. Some participants emphasize that persistent inflation above expected levels may be of concern. Federal Reserve staff's forecasts for economic growth have accelerated since October. The staff's economic outlook in the minutes mentioned that overall, by 2028, real GDP growth is expected to slightly accelerate compared to the forecasts prepared for the October meeting, mainly reflecting expectations that financial market conditions will provide greater support and potential output growth expectations have strengthened. After 2025, as the negative impact of high tariffs diminishes and fiscal policy and financial market conditions continue to support spending, it is expected that by 2028, GDP growth will remain above the potential growth rate. Therefore, it is expected that the unemployment rate will gradually decline after this year and reach a level slightly below the natural rate estimated by staff in 2027. Overall, the staff's forecasts for inflation in 2025 and 2026 are slightly lower than those presented at the meeting in October, but they are similar for 2027 and 2028. Stock News Meta (META.US) may acquire Manus AI for a transaction value of up to $25 billion. According to a source, the acquisition of Manus AI by Meta Platforms could be worth around $25 billion, including compensation for employee retention. Manus sells its products to enterprises on a subscription basis, marking Meta's first major foray into the enterprise artificial intelligence field. This deal could put Meta in a more equal position with competitors such as Salesforce, Alphabet Inc. Class C, Microsoft Corporation, and OpenAI in the AI agent competition. NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA.US) is in deep negotiations to acquire Israeli AI21 Labs for up to $30 billion. It is reported that NVIDIA Corporation is in deep negotiations to acquire Israeli artificial intelligence startup AI21 Labs for up to $30 billion. AI21 Labs' valuation in a 2023 financing round was $14 billion. NVIDIA Corporation and Alphabet's Alphabet Inc. Class C (GOOG.US) participated in the financing round. AI21 Labs was founded by Amnon Shashua and two others in 2017 and is one of the many startups benefiting from the AI boom. Shashua is also the founder and CEO of Mobileye, a developer of autonomous driving technology. The report indicates that AI21 Labs has been seeking a sale for a long time and has made significant progress with NVIDIA Corporation in recent weeks. The main interest of NVIDIA Corporation in acquiring AI21 Labs seems to be its team of about 200 employees, most of whom have advanced degrees and have "rare expertise in AI development," according to the report. The deal to acquire AI21 Labs is expected to be in the range of $20 billion to $30 billion. Amazon.com, Inc.'s (AMZN.US) AWS to invest up to $500 billion in AI systems for US government agencies. Amazon.com, Inc.'s web services (AWS) announced a plan on Monday to build and deploy systems specifically for artificial intelligence and high-performance computing for the US government for the first time. The plan promises to invest up to $500 billion to enhance the company's AI and supercomputing capabilities for US federal government customers. This investment will begin in 2026, when data centers will be built in AWS's top secret regions, AWS secret regions, and AWS government cloud (US) regions, using advanced computing and Network-1 Technologies, Inc., to add nearly 1.3 gigawatts of AI and supercomputing capabilities. Warner Bros. (WBD.US) reportedly plans to reject Paramount Skydance's (PSKY.US) takeover offer next week. Warner Bros. Discovery is reportedly exploring plans to once again reject a takeover offer from Paramount Skydance Corporation, which previously amended its takeover terms. The Warner Bros. board will hold a meeting next week, and one of the company's concerns is that Paramount has not raised its offer, while Warner Bros. had previously rejected Paramount's offer, believing it was not as good as Netflix, Inc.'s offer. Paramount publicly announced a takeover proposal on December 8 at $30 per share in cash, while Warner Bros. had already reached a deal with Netflix, Inc. three days earlier, which only involved Warner Bros.' film production division and streaming business. Since then, Paramount has twice revised its takeover proposal, with the most recent amendment also pledging $40.4 billion in equity financing and other related commitments personally guaranteed by billionaire Larry Ellison.