S&P 500 futures tick lower as traders analyze Nvidia earnings: Live updates

S&P 500 futures slipped 0.3% and Nasdaq 100 futures fell 0.4% as investors reassessed whether Nvidia’s earnings beat was strong enough to justify its AI-driven valuation. Nvidia reported better-than-expected results, raised guidance and lifted its quarterly dividend to 25 cents, but the stock was last down 1.4% in extended trading; Intuit fell more than 14% on a revenue miss and 3,000-job reduction, while E.l.f. Beauty rose over 4% after beating estimates and signaling tariff-related price rollbacks. Traders are now focused on Walmart and Workday earnings plus jobless claims, housing and manufacturing data due Thursday morning.

Analysis

The key signal is not that NVDA cleared a high bar, but that the market no longer rewards merely clearing it. That shifts the burden from earnings execution to incremental demand visibility, and it raises the importance of capex commentary from hyperscalers over the next 2-6 weeks; if those budgets stay intact, semis can re-rate again, but if they flatten, NVDA’s beat becomes a local top rather than a continuation signal.

INTU’s reset matters beyond one name because it is a clean read on SMB willingness to spend into a softer labor backdrop. A 3,000-person reduction is also a margin-defense tell, which often signals management sees demand uncertainty persisting for at least 2-3 quarters; that tends to pressure other subscription and fintech names with exposure to small business formation and tax workflows.

ELF’s move is more interesting as a consumer signal than a beauty-specific one. Pulling back tariff-related pricing suggests elasticity remains fragile at the lower end of discretionary spend, which is constructive for traffic but can compress category margins if competitors follow; the second-order beneficiary may be value-oriented retail distribution, including WMT, if consumers trade down rather than cut spend entirely.

Macro is still the swing factor: falling yields and oil gave equities room to breathe, but that relief is conditional. If tomorrow’s claims or manufacturing data surprise hot, the market could quickly reprice to 'higher-for-longer' and unwind the post-earnings optimism in duration-sensitive growth names; if they weaken, the market may rotate back into defensive quality and away from crowded AI momentum.

Key Decisions for Investors

• Stay tactically long NVDA into the next 1-2 weeks, but hedge with a short QQQ or SMH overlay; best risk/reward is to own quality AI exposure while capping downside if guidance quality is not enough to support the entire complex.
• Initiate a short INTU / long WDAY pair for the next 1-3 months; INTU faces a near-term demand reset from SMB caution, while WDAY has more leverage to enterprise IT budgets if macro remains stable. Use a tight stop if WDAY’s own guide disappoints.
• Buy WMT into tomorrow’s print only on a post-earnings confirmation of resilient basket trends; upside case is 5-8% if it shows trade-down traffic capture, but the miss risk is asymmetric if discretionary spending weakens further.
• Use ELF strength to fade premium valuation via a partial profit-taking rule or a short-dated put spread; the stock can keep working on gross margin optics, but the bigger setup is whether category-wide promo intensity rises over the next quarter.
• If yields bounce on incoming data, add a small short-duration hedge via long TLT calls or short IWM against growth-heavy books; this protects against a quick reversal in the 'soft landing' trade that is currently propping up cyclicals and high-multiple software.