Nasdaq clobbered, S&P 500 tumbles as AI fears rock Nvidia, tech stocks

The Nasdaq sank on Monday to lead a stock sell-off on Wall Street as a Chinese startup rattled faith in US leadership and profitability in AI, taking a hammer to Nvidia (NVDA) and other Big Tech stocks. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) sank nearly 3.5%, while the S&P 500 (^GSPC) dropped nearly 2%. The blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI), which is less dependent tech stocks, bucked the trend, rising 0.1%. Markets have been rattled by claims by China’s DeepSeek that its AI assistant uses cheaper chips and less data than leading models, but performs equally well. A surge in…