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Fed holds, oil surges, and a few winners hide a weak day underneath
As of Apr 29, 2026, 4:00 PM ET
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For informational purposes only.
If you just glanced at the headlines, today probably looked dull: the S&P 500 was basically flat and the Nasdaq was barely green. But if you checked your portfolio and saw a lot of red, that actually matches what was really going on.
Under the surface, it was a bruising, very selective market: a few big energy and tech names did the heavy lifting while most stocks quietly slipped.
The S&P 500 dipped about 0.04%, while the Nasdaq edged up and the Dow and small caps fell around half a percent. But breadth was ugly: only about a quarter of stocks were up, and an equal‑weight version of the market — where every stock counts the same — dropped more than 1%. New lows outnumbered new highs.
So the indexes stayed afloat not because “the market” was fine, but because leadership was narrow:
Volatility stayed contained — the VIX hovered near 18 and barely moved — but individual stock swings were big, with far more large down moves than big gains. High‑risk stocks outperformed low‑risk ones, a sign money is still willing to chase stories, not hide in safety.
1. Fed day, with a twist. The Fed kept rates unchanged, and this was Jerome Powell’s last decision as chair. He warned prices haven’t peaked, and the committee looked unusually split. Yields across the curve rose a few basis points, reinforcing the message: rate cuts are not in a hurry.
On deck is Kevin Warsh, who’s been clear he doesn’t like the old habit of telling markets exactly what’s coming. That hints at a future Fed that’s less predictable — something that can mean more swings down the road even if today looked calm.
2. Oil shock front and center. Oil and gasoline are in the spotlight: war with Iran, record‑low storage in key hubs, falling U.S. fuel inventories, and the UAE’s exit from OPEC all feed the same story — tighter supply and higher prices. Energy stocks loved it; bond markets did not, with investors worrying this keeps inflation hotter for longer.
3. AI arms race still raging. The big cloud platforms — Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Meta — are pouring more than $130 billion per quarter into AI data centers. Chip names like Intel, AMD and Micron surged again. That spending is why the Nasdaq can look fine even when a lot of other growth names are bleeding.
For the near term, the risk balance tilted a bit more toward “inflation staying sticky” and “Fed staying tough” than toward a clean soft‑landing story. Rate‑sensitive pockets — real estate, utilities, parts of consumer stocks — reflected that with outsized declines.
If you’re trying to make sense of the next few weeks, three signals matter most from here:
Today didn’t break the market, but it quietly tightened the screws: more pressure from energy, a less cuddly Fed coming, and a rally increasingly resting on a thin set of leaders.
