Preview of US Stock Market | The three major stock index futures all fell, and the Federal Reserve interest rate decision is imminent.

1. Before the US stock market opened on Wednesday, the futures of the three major US stock indexes fell together. As of the time of writing, the Dow Jones futures fell by 0.12%, the S&P 500 index futures fell by 0.12%, and the Nasdaq futures fell by 0.22%. 2. As of the time of writing, the German DAX index fell by 0.40%, the French CAC40 index rose by 0.27%, the UK FTSE 100 index fell by 0.27%, and the European Stoxx 50 index fell by 0.16%. 3. As of the time of writing, WTI crude oil rose by 0.58% to $58.59 per barrel. Brent crude oil rose by 0.48% to $62.24 per barrel. Market News The Fed is about to reveal its cards! A 25 basis point rate cut tonight is a certainty, but "hawkish" comments may dominate. The Fed is set to announce its latest interest rate decision at 3 a.m. on Thursday Beijing time. After some clear hesitation on the direction of Fed decisions for a period of time, the market now largely believes that the Fed will cut interest rates by 25 basis points for the third time, bringing the federal funds rate to 3.5%-3.75%. However, the situation is not that simple. The Federal Open Market Committee of the Fed is experiencing serious internal divisions. Some members support rate cuts to prevent further weakness in the labor market, while others believe that accommodation is sufficient and further rate cuts may exacerbate inflation. Therefore, "hawkish rate cuts" have become a popular term for this policy meeting. In market terms, this means that although the Fed will cut rates, it will also send a signal - no one should expect the next rate cut to come soon. Hassett's "quick rate cut" promise turns into a pie? Rate cut expectations suffer a setback, global long-term bond yields spike to a 16-year high. Before the critical Fed policy meeting, global bond yields had risen to their highest level since 2009, indicating market concerns that the rate cut cycle from the US to Australia may be coming to an end. An index measuring long-term government bond yields has soared to a 16-year high, and the bets in the money markets have further strengthened this sentiment. Current trader pricing shows that the European Central Bank is unlikely to cut rates further, and the Bank of Japan is almost certain to raise rates this month, while the Reserve Bank of Australia is expected to raise rates twice by next year. Even in the US, where the Fed is expected to cut rates this week, the market outlook is rapidly evolving. As investors reassess the prospects for monetary policy, inflation, and fiscal discipline, the 30-year US Treasury bond yield has climbed to multi-month highs. Pre-Fed easing expectations cool off! Bond traders bet on "shrinkage": the Fed will only cut rates twice next year. Bond traders are betting that the Fed will slow down the pace of rate cuts over the next year, which is part of a global trend betting that the Fed will slow down or stop its monetary easing policies. In addition to the expected 25 basis point rate cut on Wednesday, futures and options trading show that traders now expect the Fed to cut rates by a total of 50 basis points in 2026, with most of the cuts concentrated in the first half of this year. This is in stark contrast to the situation a week ago when the interest rate swap market expected the Fed to cut rates nearly three times next year. Similar hawkish sentiments are quickly reigniting in economies such as Australia, New Zealand, and more recently Canada and the Eurozone. This shift is occurring before key labor market data is released next week, which is likely to determine whether the market's current view of the Fed will persist. Four Fed governors may face collective dismissal? Trump: If confirmed, not one will stay! US President Trump hinted that if the appointment of Federal Reserve governors made by former President Biden was signed by an automatic signing machine, he may seek to dismiss them. This is his latest move to strengthen control over the central bank. However, this move is unlikely to succeed. Trump had previously claimed to revoke administrative orders signed by Biden using an automatic signing machine, but the result was only met with skepticism and achieved little in practice. Any effort to declare appointments approved by the Senate invalid is almost certain to face legal challenges from the appointees. Nevertheless, these comments represent Trump's latest intrusion into the independence of the central bank. Trump said at a political rally in Pennsylvania, "I heard that maybe those appointment letters were signed by an automatic signing machine. If they were really signed by an automatic signing machine - maybe I'm wrong, but we will find out." Musk admits regret for "crossing" into politics: Although it blocks billions of "zombie payments," he will definitely not come back. Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, Inc. (TSLA.US) and SpaceX, recently stated that the government efficiency department under the US White Houseestablished at the beginning of Trump's second termhas only achieved "limited" results in reducing inefficient federal spending; if given the chance to choose again, he would never get involved in this work. Musk revealed during a podcast appearance that the department had halted what he calls "zombie payments," which are federal financial expenditures without proper project codes and funding justifications. "We made some progress, it was somewhat effective," Musk admitted, "In fact, we cut a considerable amount of meaningless, pure waste of funds. Stock News Hello Group Inc. Sponsored ADR (MOMO.US) Q3 revenue decreased by 0.9%, net profit under pressure. Hello Group Inc.'s ADR recorded a net revenue of 26.501 billion RMB in the third quarter of 2025, a decrease of 0.9% year-on-year. Net profit attributable to the group decreased to 3.489 billion RMB, compared to 4.494 billion RMB in the same period last year; under non-GAAP, net profit attributable to the group was 4.045 billion RMB, lower than 4.933 billion RMB in the same period last year. Diluted net earnings per ADS were 2.06 RMB, compared to 2.46 RMB in the same period last year; non-GAAP diluted net earnings per ADS were 2.38 RMB, lower than 2.70 RMB in the same period last year. As for user scale, as of the end of this quarter, the number of paying users on the Momo App was 3.7 million, an increase of 200,000 from the previous quarter, but significantly lower than the 6.9 million in the same period last year; Tantan's paying users remained at 700,000, the same as the previous quarter, but a decrease of 200,000 from the same period last year. A hundred billion debt piled on computing power, Oracle Corporation's "AI gamble" faces judgment tonight. Despite a 23% drop in stock price in October, marking the worst single-month performance since 2001, Oracle Corporation is still up over 30% so far this year. With the stock price rebounding in November, the increase in December is close to 10% as of Tuesday. As the company is about to release its second-quarter earnings report after market on Wednesday, both the management and the newly appointed CEO are facing increasing pressure to prove that Oracle Corporation can continue to fund the company's ambitious infrastructure plans while convincing Wall Street that the story of AI-driven rapid growth remains valid. Analysts' average expectations for the company's Q2 revenue are $16.22 billion, a 15.4% year-on-year increase, with non-GAAP earnings per share of $1.64, an 11.6% year-on-year increase. JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM.US) warns that costs will exceed a trillion next year, "frighteningly" causing the market's largest drop in eight months. JPMorgan Chase's Maryanne Lake stated that the bank expects expenses to reach $105 billion next year, exceeding analysts' expectations and causing a drop in its stock price on Tuesday. Lake said at a Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. conference on Tuesday that the biggest driver of expected cost growth is "spending associated with business volumes and growth." She also pointed out strategic investments and "structural impacts of inflation." On Tuesday, JPMorgan Chase's stock price fell 4.7% to $300.51 in New York, marking the largest drop in eight months. This makes the bank the worst-performing stock in the KBW Bank Index. This guidance is even higher than the highest expected figure by analysts and surpasses the average expectation of $101.1 billion. Costs of around $105 billion are also about 9% higher than analysts' expectations for expenses in 2025. Intel Corporation (INTC.US) obtains a reduction of 140 million in fines from the European Union Court: the once record-breaking fine is further diluted. Intel Corporation has successfully reduced the remaining amount of a fine imposed by the EU for antitrust measures by nearly 140 million (approximately $163 million). The initial amount of the fine had set a record. Judges at the EU General Court in Luxembourg supported the EU Commission's decision in 2023 that Intel Corporation abused its market power in the chip market. However, the judges stated that the fine should be further reduced from the 376.36 million originally imposed by the regulatory agency, which had already been significantly reduced following a previous court ruling. The court stated in its ruling on April 30 that the reduced fine amount is around 237.1 million, "better reflecting the seriousness and duration of the relevant infringement." The European Commission as the EU's antitrust enforcement agency stated that it will "carefully examine the judgment and assess the possibility of further steps." NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA.US) plans to introduce chip "position tracking" technology to strictly prevent smuggling of high-end AI chips. According to sources, NVIDIA Corporation has successfully developed a positioning verification technology that can track the actual location of its chips in real time, which may help prevent its artificial intelligence (AI) chips from being smuggled to countries under export ban restrictions. The above sources stated that the feature was recently demonstrated internally and has not yet been officially released, but is planned to be offered as a software option for customers to install. The technology will utilize the "confidential computing" capabilities of NVIDIA Corporation's graphics processing units (GPUs) to achieve the positioning function. A senior executive at NVIDIA Corporation stated that the core design of this software is to provide customers with tracking services for the overall computational performance of the chips - a common monitoring requirement when procuring processors for large-scale data centers. A five-year investment of $35 billion! Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN.US) increases investment in India, focusing on business expansion and three strategic pillars. Amazon.com, Inc. has committed to invest $35 billion in India over the next five years to increase its presence in this key growth market. It is reported that Amazon.com, Inc. has invested nearly $40 billion in India to date. The new investment will focus on expanding businesses such as rapid e-commerce, cloud computing, and three strategic pillars - AI-driven digital transformation, export-led job creation. This massive investment by 2030 will help create an additional one million jobs in India. For companies like Amazon.com, Inc. and Alphabet Inc. Class C (GOOGL.US), large US internet companies, India, the most populous country, is still a high-growth market, despite facing regulatory hurdles and intense local competition. Important Economic Data and Events Preview 11:30 p.m. Beijing time: EIA crude oil inventory change (10,000 barrels) to the week ending December 5th. Next day at midnight Beijing time: US December IPSOS major consumer sentiment index PCSI. Next day at 3 a.m. Beijing time: Fed FOMC announces interest rate decision and economic forecast summary. Next day at 3:30 a.m. Beijing time: Fed Chairman Powell holds a monetary policy press conference. Earnings Previews Early Thursday: Oracle Corporation (ORCL.US), Adobe (ADBE.US), Synopsys, Inc. (SNPS.US) Before Market Opening on Thursday: Ciena (CIEN.US)