Wall St down as Nvidia drop outweighs energy gains

US stocks closed lower on Thursday, as a drop in Nvidia shares after CEO Jensen Huang's exit outweighed gains in energy shares. The chip company's shares fell 4.3 percent but were well off the day's lowest level after earlier dropping nearly 12 percent. Retail investors bought Nvidia shares worth about US$111 million in the first half hour of trading, the biggest opening bid on record for the stock, according to data from Vanda Analytics. The S&P 500 energy index rose 1.5 percent, its fourth straight session of gains, as the best-performing of the 11 major S&P sectors. Crude prices climbed after US President Donald Trump wrote on social media that the US did not need a deal with Iran. Global AI-linked stocks fell and AI cloud firm Nebius tumbled 16.8 percent, its biggest daily percentage drop since July 1, after reporting its quarterly earnings and outlook. But Nvidia competitors such as Broadcom, Advanced Micro Devices and Alphabet each moved higher and were among the biggest boosts to the S&P 500. Equities have been volatile in recent days. Sweeping Democratic victories in the US midterm elections have sparked investor concern about more AI regulation. Worries about Nvidia's leadership have also pressured one of the foundations...