Monday Afternoon Coffee - Markets Update - 15 Sep 2025 - Wall Street Climbs Ahead of Fed; Alphabet Tops $3 Trillion, Tesla Pops on Musk Buy

The Trade Academy Team
Sep 15
3 min read

Markets Update: U.S. stocks finished higher Monday, with the S&P 500 and Nasdaq touching intraday records as investors looked ahead to the Federal Reserve’s policy decision this week. Tesla rallied after CEO Elon Musk disclosed nearly $1 billion in stock purchases, while Alphabet vaulted past a $3 trillion market value even as Nvidia slipped on renewed regulatory pressure out of China.

Global Markets Roundup: 15 Sep 2025

Stocks Edge Higher Into Fed Week

The three major indexes advanced in choppy trade as rate-cut hopes underpinned risk appetite.

Dow Jones Industrial Average: +58.68 (+0.13%) to 45,892.90
S&P 500: +32.06 (+0.49%) to 6,616.35
Nasdaq Composite: +209.37 (+0.95%) to 22,350.48

Tesla (TSLA) climbed after filings showed Musk bought nearly $1 billion of shares on Friday. Alphabet (GOOG) hit a record high and crossed $3 trillion in market capitalization, lifting the communication services sector (S5TELS), while Tesla’s move helped push consumer discretionary (S5COND) to its highest level in nearly nine months. Offsetting some of the Dow’s gains, McDonald’s (MCD) and Procter & Gamble (PG) declined.

Nvidia (NVDA) eased after China’s market regulator said it will continue an anti-monopoly probe following preliminary findings that Nvidia violated competition law. Wall Street’s three main indexes had also logged weekly gains in the prior session, with the Nasdaq and S&P 500 notching intraday records on Friday.

Fed Looms Large

The FOMC meets September 16–17, and traders on Monday were pricing in a 96% chance of a 25-basis-point cut. Separate positioning shows markets are fully pricing a 25 bps move and about a 5% chance of 50 bps, according to the CME FedWatch Tool. Investors will sift the “dot plot” and Chair Jerome Powell’s guidance for clues on the path ahead.

Corporate Movers

CoreWeave (CRWV) jumped after the data-center operator struck a deal with Nvidia under which the chipmaker will purchase any residual cloud capacity not sold to customers; the agreement’s initial value is $6.3 billion. Kerrisdale Capital disclosed a short position in CoreWeave.

Dollar Slips as Central-Bank Week Begins

Theme: Series of central bank meetings on deck, focus on the Fed
Expectation: Fed to cut by 25 bps; BOJ and BOE tipped to hold steady
Europe: Euro EURUSD largely unmoved by Fitch’s downgrade of France’s credit rating

The dollar weakened broadly as traders awaited the Fed’s next move and after President Donald Trump urged a “bigger” rate cut in a social-media post. The dollar index DXY fell 0.4% to a nearly one-week low of 97.273. The dollar slipped 0.2% to 147.335 yen USDJPY, while the euro rose 0.3% to $1.1771. Despite stabilizing after a record slide earlier this year, many in FX still see the greenback in a bearish trend.

Beyond the Fed, rate decisions are also due this week in Japan, Britain, Canada and Norway. The BOE and BOJ are expected to leave rates unchanged, with attention on the BOE’s plans to slow its gilt runoff and on BOJ commentary about the odds of a hike later this year.

Fitch’s late-Friday downgrade stripped France of its AA- status. The move had limited market impact, with Nick Rees of Monex Europe noting the cut was largely priced in. Analysts say France’s fiscal concerns may cap near-term euro upside but are unlikely to trigger a meaningful slide. Positioning remains supportive: speculative net long euro bets rose to $18.4 billion as of the week ended September 8, near a two-year peak. Sterling (GBPUSD) gained 0.4% to $1.3606, the strongest since early July. Bitcoin slipped 0.5% to $115,323.

Nomura: “The economic projections and press conference are likely to emphasize that this is an ‘insurance’ cut, with the pace of easing remaining gradual.”

Commodities

Oil: WTI settled up 1% at $63.30 a barrel; Brent rose 0.7% to $67.44.

Gold: Front-month futures rose 0.9% to $3,682.20/oz, finishing at a new high.

Grains: Chicago wheat +0.1% to $5.24/bu; corn −1.7% to $4.23/bu; soybeans −0.1% to $10.45/bu.

Soft Commodities

Coffee prices rebounded sharply in August, with arabica up 31% and conilon up 32%, per Rabobank. Slower Brazilian exports, tight inventories, and U.S. tariffs added volatility and pushed roasters to explore alternative origins. Brazil exported 3.1 million 60-kg bags in August, down 17.5% year on year but up 14.3% from July, as exporters contended with weather impacts on the arabica harvest, logistical delays, and the 50% U.S. tariff introduced in August. Dry West African weather threatens next season’s cocoa crop; on Monday, cocoa fell 0.6% to $7,596/mt, coffee jumped 5.4% to $4.18/lb, and sugar rose 1.9% to $0.17/lb.

Outlook

With the Fed decision imminent, markets are positioned for a 25 bps cut and cues on whether easing will continue. Any deviation—or a hawkish tilt in the dots or press conference—could test equity resilience, the softer dollar, and record-setting gold.

Looking forward refer to the economic calendar below to see the upcoming events scheduled for today and the rest of the week.

General news - Information source from multiple newswires.

The article and the data is for general information use only, not advice!

The Trade Academy Team