Schwab and Wells Fargo climb; Nvidia dips

Bank stocks and chip stocks split apart on April 29. Charles Schwab and Wells Fargo held up well, while Nvidia and Micron slipped, and the uglier selling hit crypto-linked names like SoFi, Robinhood, and Coinbase. That kind of tape matters because it tells you what traders want exposure to right now — steadier earnings and cheaper valuations, not the most crowded momentum trades. Basically, this was a rotation day. ### Why were banks stronger? Financials had a simpler story. Schwab came into this stretch with fresh momentum from strong first-quarter results — 1.3 million new brokerage accounts, $140 billion in core net new assets, and record quarterly revenue of $6.5 billion. Wells Fargo also had a solid recent earnings print, with first-quarter net income rising to $5.25 billion from $4.89 billion a year earlier. Those are not flashy AI numbers, but they are sturdy, and on a nervous market day sturdy wins. (content.schwab.com) ### Why did Schwab stand out? Schwab is a bank-brokerage hybrid, so it benefits when investors want financial exposure without taking pure credit risk. Its first-quarter report showed client assets up to a record $11.8 trillion and asset gathering still running hot. That gave traders a concrete reason to keep buying the stock even as riskier(content.schwab.com)m hanging over big tech. (content.schwab.com) ### What hit Nvidia and Micron? The chip trade looked tired. Nvidia had just come off a huge run — Yahoo Finance noted the stock had surged 19% in April and recently pushed its market value back above $5 trillion. Micron had also ripped higher, up 37% in April. When a group runs that hard, it does not need terrible news to fall — it just needs buyers to pause. That seems to be what happened here. (finance.yahoo.com) ### Was this about AI demand fears? Partly, yes. Schwab’s own market update pointed to fresh questions around AI demand after a Wall Street Journal report said OpenAI missed internal revenue and usage projections. OpenAI pushed back, but the market reaction showed how sensitive chip names still are to any hint that the AI spending boom might cool. Nvid(finance.yahoo.com). So even small doubts hit hard. (schwab.com) ### Why did SoFi get crushed? SoFi’s drop was more specific. The company posted first-quarter profit that had doubled, with record loan originations and member growth, but it kept its full-year 2026 forecast unchanged. That was the catch. Investors wanted an upside revision, not just good execution. When a stock is priced for acceleration, “we’re doing great, but guidance stays the same” can be read as a disappointment. (money.usnews.com) ### And Robinhood and Coinbase? Robinhood missed estimates for profit and revenue as crypto-driven volatility hurt trading-volume growth, and the stock fell about 11% on the day. Coinbase slid too as crypto-linked equities sold off together. This looked less like one company blowing up and more like the market marking down the whole high-beta, crypto-exposed corner at once. (money.usnews.com) ### Why does this kind of divergence matter? Because it shows where the market thinks the easy money has already been made. Banks still look cheaper on plain old earnings multiples. Chip and crypto names still carry much bigger expectations. On a day when traders want to de-risk without going fully defensive, mo(money.usnews.com)over or that banks suddenly became exciting. It was a reminder that leadership changes when expectations get stretched. Schwab and Wells Fargo benefited from that reset. Nvidia, Micron, SoFi, Robinhood, and Coinbase paid for it.