In a day marked by significant market turbulence, tech giants Okta and GitLab delivered standout performances. Okta's stock surged 15% following its unexpected fourth-quarter results, while GitLab also surpassed expectations with a revenue of $211 million. These developments occurred amid a broader market sell-off, triggered by President Donald Trump's confirmation that 25% tariffs on goods from Canada and Mexico would take effect on Tuesday.
Okta reported earnings of 78 cents per share, excluding items, on revenue of $682 million, outperforming analysts' predictions of 74 cents per share and $670 million in revenue. The cloud software company's impressive performance stood out as the S&P 500 posted its most significant daily loss since December, dropping 1.76%.
Meanwhile, GitLab experienced a 4% increase in its stock following its announcement of adjusted earnings of 33 cents per share for the fourth quarter, exceeding the 23 cents anticipated by analysts polled by LSEG. GitLab's revenue also exceeded forecasts, reporting $211 million against an expected $206 million.
The broader market faced significant pressure as the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell by 649.67 points, or 1.48%, and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 2.64%. This downturn came as all three major indexes, initially trading higher, shifted into negative territory in response to the impending tariffs.
CoreWeave also made headlines as it filed to go public on the Nasdaq on Monday afternoon. The company, which gained prominence following OpenAI's release of ChatGPT, provides cloud-based Nvidia graphics processing units to major corporations such as Meta and Microsoft. CoreWeave chose "CRWV" as its new ticker symbol for the upcoming initial public offering (IPO), which comes amid a broad market sell-off.
President Trump's tariff announcement had a pronounced impact on Nvidia, whose shares fell nearly 9%, resulting in a $265 billion loss in market capitalization. However, U.S. stock futures showed resilience, rising Monday night after the tariff announcement.
Investors sought refuge in defensive sectors like consumer staples and healthcare, which advanced by 0.6% and 0.4%, respectively. AST SpaceMobile, a satellite manufacturer, saw its shares increase by 2% after reporting a narrower-than-expected fourth-quarter loss.
Despite the day's challenges, CoreWeave's IPO debut demonstrates the continued interest in tech companies poised for growth.
"We don't see the market going a whole lot of anywhere really fast," said Scott Ladner, chief investment officer at Horizon Investments.
Ladner further commented on the market sentiment:
"We are at a place where sentiment is really in the toilet and that makes getting reversals out of this probably a little bit of a slog."